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It’s a sickness of the heart, but I feel it low in the belly. Like an ache. Like nausea. Like if I open my mouth I’ll cough up everything in me. But he’s there. Sherlock’s there - everywhere he shouldn’t be. Always tripping me up, right outside my range of vision. Caught in the corner of my eye.
The smell of chlorine. The ripple of light off a still body of water.
The call goes out. We’re moving in, I know what will happen next. There will be a firefight. I hear children’s voices, high and strange.
I touch my face, brush away debris from hitting the asphalt. Did I drop my gun (my phone?) when the biker put me off balance?
I see him again, pale and flickering in the distance.
No, Sherlock, I want to yell, get away. But he sees me somehow, draws near. I’m about to be shot, he’ll be in the way. Sherlock, don’t! My mouth moves, and nothing comes out.
He reaches me, dressed all wrong for the desert, coat collar turned up against the battering sand.
“John,” he says softly, his voice clear and low, “I had one. I had one just. like. you.” He leans down, kisses me gently on my shoulder, my chest. With each word, a kiss. With each kiss, an explosion of heat and wet at my shoulder. A bloom of pain like starlight, sharp and bright.
I try to push him away. My arms won’t respond. Then my hands suddenly connect to bare skin, snap like a slap against his chest.
His breath out, a quick sigh. Try to kick away, my legs are caught in slippery sheets. What? Dark crowds out light. He fights his way past me, to pull me close to him.
“No, no it’s alright.” wraps me in his arms as I take a few gasping breaths. I’m afraid I might be sick, it’s happened before with these nightmares.
No. Steady myself.
“You’re fine, John. You’re perfectly safe.” His voice is a soothing murmur.
“‘m’alright.” I breathe in a rush. He is squeezing me gently in his arms, rocking back and forth. I’m not a child, I want to say. But the press of his hands on me does feel right. And I can actually take a breath.
“I’m sorry I put you through this.”
“‘m’fine, ‘m’alright.” I repeat, then take another staggering breath. “Been having nightmares for ages, long before we met.”
“Yes, but your dreams had been decreasing in frequency and severity.” Then, almost a whisper, “This is my fault.”
I don’t know what to say, so I lean into him, my head against his chest, my arms around him. Stroke his back. It grounds me. Returns me to reality. As the terror fades, a wave of exhaustion threatens to take me back down under.
“You’re not sleeping?” it’s more of a statement than a question, and he hears it for what it is.
“I can hardly sleep with you thrashing around like that, can I?” he responds, mock peevishly. I start to speak but a burst of worry catches me. His voice was too clear, I really hadn’t just woken him. Dark half moons under his eyes spoke to true tiredness, plain lack of sleep. Beautiful and lean normally, now my fingers played over the too-defined arches of each rib. He was still no frail little thing; his slim, powerful body was taut with muscle. But he had been whittled down, all his meager reserves tapped.
Now he felt to be bone and sinew beneath me, raw and alive. I pulled him down to me, as if the subtle lullaby of my sleeping breath could lull him to sleep. Or maybe I just wanted him close. He settled down with me, tucking his angles carefully into mine. He kept his warm hand at the nape of my neck.
I fought sleep briefly, running my hands along those long lines, what felt like acres of skin. His eyes crept closed. Then, I remembered the name.
“Sherlock,” I whispered, and he answered with a low hum. “Who is Corliss?
Brilliantly blue eyes peering into mine, wide and searching. Another hum, of disinterest this time, a slight shrug of his shoulder.
“No one. Nobody. A friend from school.”
Oh, Sherlock, you clever boy, no. I know you much too well now. And you know I do. I felt you tense beside me, can feel your heart thump in your chest.
He turns his face from me, gracefully exposing that long neck. I can see his pulse fluttering just there. A breath. He looks back at me, eyebrows lifted, asking for agreement, for an indulgence.
And he knows I know; Corliss isn’t nobody. But he’s asking something: leave this. Leave it for now. And because the last few days have twisted and torn at us, I do.
*
Back to Baker Street, we take a case that night. The days pass in a rush.
A plain young woman, missing and seemingly left no clue behind. But there are clues - they keep getting sent anonymously to The Yard. These strange posts, plus the seeming lack of clues convinces Sherlock that we should take it - normally missing persons aren’t of interest to him (too many runaway teens, unhappy partners fleeing failing marriages).
First, slide swiped with epithelial cells. The day they call us in, and there are liver cells. Days and days old, I’m sad to say. Nothing else comes in the packet - just a glass slide, her name, and the type of cells written in red china maker on it.
We hope it’s a madman keeping her somewhere, some loon with a fetish for something like biopsies. Over the coming days, we visit and revisit her tiny flat, Sherlock driven wild by disturbed evidence (he blames the incompetent investigators before us, I think it could just as easily have been that no evidence existed that could have been disturbed).
About a week into the case, after a day spent running halfway over London following clues that amount to nothing, I finally fall asleep on the sofa sometime in the wee hours of the morning. He wakes me, gently calling my name from across the room. Sure that he wants something, I’m a bit miffed. I could use the sleep. Instead, when I shuffle over to him, he leans his cheek briefly into my outstretched hand. He glances up from the missing girl’s NHS records.
“Go to bed, John.”
His voice is kind.
“You’ll wake me if -”
I take the top page, something we picked up from her local surgery. It’s a handwritten scrawl that says she was putting off a minor procedure because she didn’t have someone to make sure she makes it home, or to sit with her for a few hours after. As I read it, my hand involuntarily found its way to my chest.
“What is it?” He was studying me closely, eyes narrowed.
“Just...poor girl.”
I handed him back the note, he looked at me as if it was the first time we’d met.
“I love you, John Watson.”
Why’s he staring at me like I’ve invented something just now? He’s maddening at times, inscrutable. I kiss the top of his head, he’s already turned back to his files.
That night, I sleep long and heavy. And I do not dream.
*
Our missing girl, she has a blog, a sort of combination of sad poetry collection and journal. No one reads it, the hit count is under a few hundred and it’s been up for years. Sherlock discounts it, then comes back to it later, assigns it to me on the basis that he has no patience for poetry. I stay up late that night reading it. When I’m done I slink into bed, and he comes to sit next to me, asks me what I’ve found.
“It is sad,” I confirmed for him, “but hopeful too. She was lonely. It all reads as terribly lonely. Moved to the city, trying to start her life, trying to get away from a shit childhood in the country. But nothing ever seems to get started. She worked hard, never met anyone. Men really gave her the short shrift.”
He says nothing, his eyes flickering over me, not seeing me.
The next day, the technician opens another packet from our perp. There are uterine cells swabbed on yet another slide. I feel a terrible pang for the girl who wrote so eloquently on wanting children.
Sherlock’s usual mania is tamped down, despite the fact that this sort of case usually exhilarates him. We question her friends from work and before he speaks, he looks back at me, again and again, treading carefully.
She had obviously been depressed, stopped going out with the girls from work. They’d never been close, anyway. She had become even more withdrawn in the last weeks.
With that, Sherlock left suddenly, a flourish of dark coat. I made my apologies as I hustled out the door behind him. I followed him all the way back to the the missing girls flat. His long legs put him easily ahead of me, and I had to go at a bit of a jog to keep up.
In a bit of a huff, I sat down on the bench at the foot of the bed. Sherlock was glancing around her room, trying to see it for the first time. He ran his fingers slowly around the shelves above her tiny desk. Finally, he peered closely at a stack of stationery.
“Mid-range stuff, quite pricey for a girl on her budget. Didn’t use it often.”
I sigh, smiling a little.
“How can you tell?”
An answering smile lights his face as his eyes meet mine. It’s a smug quirk of a smile, but he shines nonetheless.
“The sunlight’s faded it, just barely. The top envelope has been exposed for a while. And look, there’s a distinctive pattern of fading on the stack of envelopes, where they’ve overlaid each other.” I look closely, I can’t quite make out as much as he does, but there’s a barely noticeable strip of lighter colour across the tops.
He looks up at me again, from the stack he was riffling through. His face is drawn. The smile is gone.
“Oh, John,” he says softly. “I’m so sorry. She’s dead.”
I can’t even process what he’s saying.
“What?” I’ve known him for years, I should learn to sound slightly less incredulous. “Is there a note or something there?”
He shakes his head, reaches for his phone.
He explains it later - the missing envelope told him the letter was to someone important; she was a tech-savvy girl and emailed her few friends and family back home. So whoever she wrote the letter to was important enough that she didn’t just choose the top envelope. She carefully considered which one was the most perfect. A man, then. A dating profile on one of the most popular dating sites showed no activity for the past few weeks, aside from a single message setting up a date. He’d already been interviewed and ruled out. The bloke hadn’t even met her, just saw her waiting at the table and turned tail. Sherlock decided the bar staff needed talking to, he was thinking she was particularly vulnerable and someone had taken advantage.
A smooth operator, they called him. He’d moved in straightaway after he heard the missing girl tell the barmaid she’d been stood up. The staff couldn’t believe such a handsome fellow was devoting his evening to such a plain girl, but he appeared to be smitten. He’d made the mistake of paying with a credit card.
Within two hours, we were with the Yarders, making the arrest. Looking for the girl. I breathed a sigh of relief when they hauled off the offender, he was babbling incoherently about curing the world of women, that he could prove they weren’t human. He had some sort of lab set-up - a lot of pricy equipment, but some of it quite antiquated. A number of slides prepped to mail. Sherlock ignored it all. He stood in front of the industrial freezer. He had already opened it, and then shut it gently. Empty, I assumed.
I was exhausted. My knees were weak, we’d been working this case for days. I wanted to find the girl and go home. Sherlock grabbed my wrist, hard, stopping me short.
“John.” He whispered, my name a warning. “You might not want to see this.”
In the fucking freezer. I swore under my breath, catching Sherlock’s concerned look with my quizzical one. Why was he shielding me from things? Was that something we did for each other now that so much had changed? I steeled myself, gave him a nod.
He gently squeezed my wrist again, let it go as he opened the steel door.
I had seen worse.
But not more painful. The noisy world of the crime scene faded to a hush as I observed her, pointing out details to Sherlock. He relayed them to the crime scene technicians, my own voice sounding too faded to be relied upon.
He’d done it while she was alive. Taken tissue samples. Opened her up. Removed bits of flesh and bone. None of the wounds was fatal taken alone, or would have been, given proper medical attention. Instead, he’d locked her in the freezer, where she bled to death. (Sherlock pointed out how the strange series of scratches on the handle indicated the safety latch had been overridden by a simple chain and padlock).
It had been a hard death. There was a thick pool of ice below her, it was slick and crimson. She had bled out and froze. Her tears were frozen to her face, making clear tracks on her pale skin through the haze of blood.
Sherlock’s voice goes on and on, he’s riding the high. I notice the sweep of her dark hair, the icy tears crusted in her long lashes. Sherlock brings his hand close to her face. I flinch. She’s had enough, I want to shout. I want to vomit. Then, just loud enough for me to barely hear, he says “I’m sorry.” to the poor, frozen girl.
Then we’re moving, back up the stairs. His hand is gently guiding me, pressure against the small of my back. He doesn’t slow down, even when the Detective Inspector practically begs him - gives him the perfect opportunity to show off. Instead, Sherlock turns away, says he’s exhausted, he must go home and rest.
It’s a lie, of course. He couldn’t be more awake, gratified his cleverness has lead him somewhere new this time. He’s eager to taxonomize what looks like a new brand of madman.
And then we’re in the damp, chill air of early morning. I guess it’s something like three am. Everything is still strangely muted; I can still see her behind my eyes. That hank of hair, those icy lashes.
A taxi. Sherlock settles me against him, his arm around my shoulders. I feel like a small boy. I can’t hear anything. My eyes are open, but I feel blind somehow. Absent. I feel Sherlock move against me, his face down next to mine. His voice, warm and careful in my ear.
“John, I think you might be experiencing an acute stress reaction.”
A snort. A voice not my own “What? I’m not in shock.”
But it sends a silent part of me to work, assessing. I have stepped away, just a bit. To keep myself safe.
I take a deep breath. The world returns to full color.
“Good.” He says kindly, a bit strained.
How did so much time pass? We’re walking up the stairs to the flat. I feel simultaneously weightless and that my legs are too heavy for me to possibly move. His hand, again, at the small of my back.
Inside, “Alright, I’ll put the kettle on.” I realize it is the most laughably, quintessentially british thing to say, but it comes out on it’s own.
“No.” He says, guiding me still, sitting me down on the sofa. “I’ll make tea.”
My mouth falls open. “You never make tea.” He rubs his fingers briskly through my hair, walks away saying “Doesn’t mean I don’t know how.”
I blink, and he’s holding a mug in front of me. At eye level. My hands reach for it automatically. It’s too hot to drink but my fingers feel so cold. He sits beside me, too close.
He is studying me, I can feel it.
“Are you...” His question meanders off. I hear the silent ending - alright? Talking about emotions - not really his area. Doesn’t matter.
“She was so alone! This...it’s so wrong!” I can’t look at him. I put down the cup, stupid hands are shaking.
He doesn’t respond. I hear his measured, even breaths. He slowly moves his hand until it rests on my knee lightly. I jerk my knee away and shout “We didn’t save her!”
His voice nearly impossibly low and calm. “John, by the time we took the case, she was already...” He stops. “gone.” I don’t know if I should be comforted or terrified that Sherlock has just used what he considers a “pointless and sentimental euphemism for death.”
He reaches for me again. “Sadness taking the form of anger, so typical for men of your age. You saw yourself in her, which is why this is difficult for you.”
I want to fight him, shout him down. But he’s right. Of course he’s right. Infuriating wanker.
He folds me in his arms. I find myself a bit ashamed of that sort of emotional outburst. Not like me. Especially when we’re working. We’re both silent for a few long minutes.
“I don’t like it when the cases upset you.” I start to protest that it’s the nature of the cases we take, it’s not going to change, but he goes on. “When anything upsets you.” He squeezes me tight. I hear everything he doesn’t say - that he cares, that he worries when things affect me.
“I know, I’m sorry if it...distracts you.” He gives a sudden sound of dismissal, he doesn’t consider how it might change how he works important. “But, it’s just...the timing, I suppose. Reading her blog - I felt that way.”
“Alone.” He says quietly.
“Lonely, and...hopeless? Wanting more, knowing you won’t get it, but being hopeful anyhow?”
He takes my hand. His voice is hesitant, careful. “You could have that.” He swallows hard. “With me.” Bright eyes peering down at me, a gift, an offering he knows he might not understand.
I chuckle almost noiselessly, “I already do have that with you, I have more.” More than I ever dreamed, actually.
He shakes his head. “I’ve been thinking about his a long time. I know you broke things off with Karen because she didn’t want to marry, didn’t want what you want. Children. All that.”
An hour ago we were staring at a dead girl. Now Sherlock’s rehashing my failed relationships.
“Bit early for all that, isn’t it?” I smile.
He shakes his head again. “No. No, it isn’t. I - yes, it is. I just. Wanted you to know that...all that. I want you to know that I think of it. That I want to give you what you want. Need.” He looks away.
My heart hammers at my ribcage. “Oh,” I press my face into his neck. I have been so blind for so long. “That was years ago, how long have you been thinking about that? And her name was Kara, by the way.”
He blinks, trying to think of an answer.