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Something in John’s shoe dislodges as they cross the threshold into Baker Street. He squeezes his eyes shut and prays for it to be some insignificant detritus he missed emptying out – a tiny pebble, maybe, some bit of vegetation completely innocent in nature – and not a fragment of bone, not the remains of a small child.
He can’t quite bring himself to remove the ruined leather and check. Not just yet.
The scratchy emergency blankets they were both wrapped in six hours ago were not nearly enough to remove the chill of well water entirely. John shivers, standing there in the quiet living room. Watches without comment, as Sherlock begins to light a fire, still wearing his coat.
The ride back felt long and empty. Greg didn’t press them for official statements, so they didn’t give any. Ducked into the nearest police car and left Musgrave in a blur, exhausted and unconscious to the world outside.
When they hit the early morning light of London everything came swimming back and John almost, very nearly, emptied his guts onto cold pavement.
He managed to swallow it though. Just like everything else.
And now – finally toeing off his shoes and socks and flexing bare toes against the rug – he can taste the bile rising in his throat again.
Sherlock still hasn’t said anything. Peels off his Belstaff and throws it with disregard over the desk chair. Rolls up his sleeves and kicks off his shoes too. Slumps down into his armchair looking shattered and slightly grey, and older than John ever remembers him being.
There are scratches on Sherlock’s arms. Long red lines and blurry scrapes. John looks at his own hands, bitten with cuts, dirty still from wet soil and clawing his nails at old brick. Replays the thought he had, down there in the darkness alone, that this was the end. And how amid the panic and vaguely scrabbling for purchase, after the final kick of adrenaline – he could do little else to make it stop.
Until he saw Sherlock there. Silhouetted against the full moon of the well mouth, waiting for him to climb back out again.
Sherlock, who is still alive, despite everything. Despite every person he loves trying to drag him down into the deep, one way or another.
“Right,” John says, flexing his hands once more before looking to the fireplace. “Tea”
Sherlock’s head dips in agreement, as wood begins to crackle softly.
The linoleum is cold on John’s toes as he flicks the kettle on and puts two teabags into mugs. In the living room Sherlock sits completely still in his seat, feet planted on the floor and forearms flat against the rests. His eyes are closed, so John takes the opportunity to look. Does not guard his concern as he observes a man slowly falling apart, holding on by a single breath.
Sherlock’s eyes blink back open again with the sound of the kettle coming to a boil. John pours their drinks and doesn’t wait long enough for it to brew, adds a splash of milk to something that now resembles dish water more than tea. Not that it matters much. He hands one to Sherlock who puts it down immediately, just as John settles his own onto the side table and sinks down into his armchair.
Silence again, for a moment. Then John watches. Observes the small parting of Sherlock’s lips, the pinching between his eyebrows as that exhale happens, as the oxygen is released – except Sherlock does not break like he should. Keeps hold of whatever so desperately wants to exit his body, until his entire torso shakes.
John watches and doesn’t know what to say. Cannot remember what he wanted, back when he was the one crumbling slowly from the inside out.
“What was he like –” John pauses, wonders if he should even speak at all. “Do you remember him, at all?”
For a second, he worries if maybe that’s the wrong question.
Then he thinks of Mary, and how much he just wanted to speak about her. To remember all the ways that she made him feel good, even though in the end she made him feel terrible, too.
Sherlock looks up at him like he’s not really there. As if his eyes are an open door into memories that have long been locked away. For the longest time Sherlock doesn’t speak, his face glazing over while he flits through dusty files in his mind. John doesn’t disturb the tension. Doesn’t reach for his weak tea or allow himself to breathe too loudly. Just waits.
“Fast,” Sherlock begins. “He was – fast. Always running ahead of me, I think – I could never keep up”
John sees them, chasing each other. Sherlock with his wooden sword and badly constructed pirate hat, struggling to run through the brush at Musgrave.
“He made me laugh”
Sherlock’s eyes are closed again. Fingers curled around the edges of his armchair, brow furrowed and lips tight.
“That’s what I liked most about him – we laughed together, always together”
Something wet warms John’s cheek and he brushes it away, blinks it back as Sherlock continues to search in the darkness for more thoughts, moving pictures that neither of them will ever truly know are real or not.
“He was my best friend, John”
Sherlock’s irises are saturated and framed with red, bursting veins as he holds John’s gaze and really looks this time.
“My entire life, I thought you were the only one, that I was – incapable. That I was –”
Pale wrists vibrate slightly as Sherlock brings the edges of his thumbs to his cheeks, holds them against his eyes as they begin to release, finally.
“Faulty, somehow”
Pain prickles in John’s chest and he swears under his breath, shakes his head and bites the inside of his cheek. Before he really knows what he’s doing, John is standing, bridging the small gap between their chairs with his hands clenched at his sides. Wanting to help and offer comfort, and not quite recalling how to do either.
“Sherlock” He breathes out, willing himself to say something more.
He is empty, though. John’s mouth can’t form any words that haven’t already been said, that wouldn’t be meaningless against the tirade of hurt and betrayal and heartache currently churning inside the man in front of him.
He has never been good at this. Has never been able to say or do the right thing to save the person he loves. Not when it really matters.
And here they are again. Both drifting away slowly into an infinite horizon, unanchored as they have been for more time than either of them has been willing to admit. Tethered only by each other, and the knots they’ve tied in the rope that keeps them connected. A line that is frayed and rotting slightly from being in putrid waters for years – but a line, nonetheless. One Sherlock has always pulled at, time and time again, to remind John that he is still on the other end of it.
Sherlock deserves that too. More than ever. To know he is still there – that John is still there, even if he has been far away for a long time.
“Sherlock,” John says again, as his hand finds a curved shoulder. “Come here”
It is what it is
Except it shouldn’t be. They should not have to do this. There should not be a world in which Sherlock is trembling with hurt, so much that John can feel it, breaking across his chest as Sherlock presses his forehead against it. Curls his torso towards John’s until hot breath warms the space there. John flattens his other palm gently along Sherlock’s shoulder blades and then to the back of his neck. Echoing a touch that he once felt, that brought him back from a peak of grief.
No sound comes from Sherlock’s throat, from his sadness, yet John can still hear it. Dripping softly from the body in his arms, the long fingers resting lightly against his shirt and then slowly clenching, taking fistfuls of brushed cotton. John strokes his thumb across Sherlock’s hairline, lip caught between his teeth so hard it almost breaks skin.
They breathe together, and with each in and out John finds himself relaxing. Finds his knees have slotted either side of one of Sherlock’s bent legs, the closeness not as awkward or unwelcome as it once would have been.
Nothing happens for an indistinguishable time. John’s head hums and replays through a thousand things and can’t pull out anything singular to focus on, nothing to distract him from the rise and fall of Sherlock’s lungs, the heat radiating from his struggling body.
John can’t even really put his finger on what time it is anymore. Dull autumn sun ebbs behind the curtains, breaking over the pewter grey of London, enough morning illumination to make out a smear of dirt below Sherlock’s ear. To see a lighter strand or two threading through the locks John’s fingertips are straying to.
He gives in, a little. Allows his chin to dip and find the crown of Sherlock’s head. The cushion of it brushes against John’s three-day shave. At his chest, Sherlock flattens out his hands, releases the bundles of cotton between his knuckles and brackets the plane of John’s ribs instead. Each exhale sounds loud now. John lets his own puff out into Sherlock’s hair, open mouthed breaths and lips against soft inky black.
One of them should say something. John should, probably, remove his hands – one now combing slowly through sweat ruined curls, the other drifting back and forth between Sherlock’s shoulder blades, stalling on the fold of his shirt collar. Yet he does nothing to remedy any of it, trapped in a place neither of them has ever really been before.
Sherlock’s mouth is moving, but he isn’t speaking either. John can feel it open and close there against his sternum, the fleshy hill of that bottom lip catching on his shirt buttons, as if he’s trying and faltering over and over again.
John doesn’t want to falter anymore. Has his nose buried and smelling everything they’ve been through in the last twenty four hours, everything underneath that’s unmistakably Sherlock, the sweet of his skin and woody tones of his shampoo.
John doesn’t want to falter – and so when Sherlock looks up, peels away from his chest and brings their eyes together, he doesn’t. He meets his gaze and all it means, drops his palm to the back of Sherlock’s neck again and holds him there.
Holds on, even though his insides are shaking. Even though his bottom lip is too, as he tests it gently to Sherlock’s. Does what he couldn’t do last time, but wanted to. Slides their noses together and parts his mouth, steals air from the pliant man beneath him. Sherlock – who is still and open, somehow allowing John to do this, break through to something else, on the edge of more. And he keeps going, the barest of touches, trying not to be consumed by the gravity pulling him down, almost over the line but not quite – until he feels his knees give way.
Sherlock steadies him though, as he always has. Grips John’s biceps and presses up until they’re kissing properly, moving against each other now with more clarity. John squeezes Sherlock’s neck and angles his head better, wets Sherlock’s bottom lip with his tongue and keeps kissing him. Does not want to stop.
The moment is broken as Sherlock stands, somehow strong and together even though John can feel everything fracturing apart around them. Immediately there’s a hand at his jaw, framing his face and pulling him forwards, bumping chests and a second of imbalance until John finds Sherlock’s hip. Tugs and braces the other at his lower back, shirt sticky from exertion and wrinkling from John’s desperate fingers.
One of them should say something, John thinks again, but that’s as far as it gets. Just a thought, because Sherlock is still fucking kissing him, making small panting noises that John wishes he’d never heard and also wants to hear for the rest of time. Maddening sounds that make his hands pull the shirt from Sherlock’s trousers, seeking contact, skin beneath his palms as he slides them up and beneath cotton.
The fire is still on, and John only notices because he’s being pushed a little too close to it. Parts for a second even though he really doesn’t want to, his hands still flush against Sherlock’s bare skin, warm at his heaving ribs.
They look at each other again and Sherlock seems wild. Flushed and pink with want and grief, both things existing in almost equal force. John flits his eyes from the rose of his cheeks to the mouth he wants to taste again and again, but has to ask – has to make sure, despite the demon in his head telling him not to.
“I think we’ve both –” John clears his throat, voice forgotten from the insistence of Sherlock’s kiss. Considers the words in his head, wrestles with them for a moment. “Yeah – we’ve both wanted – this, for a long time, right?”
Christ knows he’s never been a wordsmith, and Sherlock smiles a little.
“I just need to – you’re sure you definitely–”
Whatever mess was about to come next is silenced by Sherlock’s mouth again. Slower, claiming each word and folding them away back into the recesses of John’s mind, where they can take care of them another time. Not now, while there’s just the right cocktail of agony and need to keep going, and exhaustion enough to let them both relent to something that’s always been there.
John would have him against the wall. Right there next to the bookcase where they can shake the photo frames from their nails and knock the collection of dead things from the shelves. He would, but he also wants nothing more than to be in Sherlock’s bed, be invited there, to a room he has only ever been a visitor in.
The effort to prise his lips from Sherlock’s neck is immense, yet worth the concentration of desire he finds in the glassy blue eyes above him. Sherlock knows the question burning between them, of course he does, nods as he closes fingers around John’s wrist.
They pause at the living room light switch, John trailing behind Sherlock, his hand moving to intertwine their fingers as Sherlock flicks it off. Past the kitchen table and their half-eaten breakfasts from days ago, plates that should have been washed but were abandoned in favour of a trip across the sea.
Then to Sherlock’s bedroom door, some kind of impenetrable fortress John never thought he’d find his back against; being bracketed strongly by Sherlock’s hands at his hips, pulling and pushing both at the same time, too eager to cross the threshold and too off kilter by need to function and turn the handle.
John manages it though, squeezes his palm behind his back and turns it with his tongue in Sherlock’s mouth.
The bed sheets are unmade. John can see the imprint of Sherlock there, the wrinkles where his body has been and moved throughout the night, the dip in the dark grey pillow where he has lain, no doubt wide awake.
They’re really going to do this, John realises. Because Sherlock’s hands haven’t left the waistband of his jeans, and his eyes haven’t stopped raging with icy fire since he looked up at him from his armchair.
John moans, some low animal thing that encompasses the knowledge of that, and how long he has waited for it. Both his hands are working Sherlock’s shirt buttons, not as smoothly as he’d like because this is still big. Still a thing he hasn’t really planned for, only in fleeting moments when he has allowed his mind to truly relax, let it think about what it might be like, if they were other people entirely.
But they’re still them. People who die and kill for each other, the puckered flesh near Sherlock’s heart says as much. They are recovering, still not wholly right, and yet Sherlock hasn’t shoved him away, is watching him with hooded eyes as John reveals the plane of his chest inch by inch. Bends down to kiss the space below John’s ear that he must know, somehow, makes John want to tear him apart and piece him right back together again.
“Christ,” John curses, tilting his neck so Sherlock can graze teeth lightly over his sensitive skin. “Christ’s sake, don’t ever stop doing that”
Sherlock’s throat is hoarse and deep and rumbles straight to John’s belly as he laughs low against him, hooks thumbs over the waistband he’s been toying with for the last few minutes. John feels the tug as Sherlock pulls open the first button, has to abandon wrestling with his own shirt collar to steady himself on Sherlock’s biceps.
John’s right sleeve is dirty, a ley line of water stain across deep blue. He notices it right before he closes his eyes, Sherlock’s palm reaching down into his parted jeans and cupping him, fingers long and warm and for a second everything goes dark.
Perhaps he curses again but John can’t hear anything except the blood rushing in his own ears. His heartbeat, thumping out of time with the slow morning light around them, racing against his chest as if it may leap out.
“Sherlock” John breathes, his head crammed into the space below Sherlock’s neck. “Sherlock”
There’s that smear of mud or soot or something not good, again, on Sherlock’s skin. John wants to try and erase it but he can’t, gets distracted by the temptation of Sherlock’s jaw, so close, sharp and rough beneath his lips as he mouths it. Can smell the day on them both, more pungent than before now they’re hot and pressed together and constantly vibrating.
“Shower,” Sherlock says, contrary to the hand still palming and stroking over John’s boxers. “We should shower”
It takes a moment for John to agree because everything is so tight and close. He’s hard beneath Sherlock’s touch and moving away from that now seems near impossible. Eventually he does though, groans as the contact is stolen. John wastes no time in stepping out of his jeans and boxers, removes his grimy shirt, all while watching Sherlock’s fall from his shoulders, suit trousers quickly following into a pool on the floor. The scars that run across the mountain of Sherlock’s back, down his spine and all the way to his bare arse, make John’s breath hitch.
More words and questions they can’t address right now, though.
Sherlock is naked, holding open the bathroom door for him.
John steps through and keeps their eyes locked because he can’t look down past Sherlock’s chest just yet. Years he’s spent telling himself he doesn’t want any of this – not this kind of body, lean and muscular – and John doesn’t have a clue what to do. Can’t find any hidden part of himself that knows how to deal with the knowledge he’s been wrong all this time. He’s been lying to himself, because he certainly does fucking want this. Has said so, out loud, like it was easy. And now in the fresh light of the bathroom, it seems more difficult than it ever has.
If Sherlock feels the same, he doesn’t show it. Turns on the shower faucet and steps back towards him, smooths hands up and along John’s biceps and to his face again. Then they’re kissing. John is melting, quickly disintegrating into Sherlock’s touch. The sure placement of his palms and the meeting of their hips as closeness becomes inevitable, the ease at which Sherlock moulds into him like he isn’t fearful at all. As if he has been the rock all this time, and John has just been clinging on like wave battered seaweed, nothing without the strength of the man pressed against him.
More noises are spilling from his lips as he claims Sherlock’s mouth with fervour, swallows the shadows of denial, the ghosts of his former self trying their best to make him back away – and presses their naked bodies together. Almost dies, right there, when deep moans tumble into his ears and shoulder as Sherlock begins to rock forwards against his hip.
The bathroom is steaming up around them. John indulges in the friction for a moment more, then noses Sherlock’s face up, gestures to the hot running water next to them. They climb in, awkwardly. John catches his shin on the side of the tub but it’s just another bruise, another bit of damage they can start to undo now.
The sound of the shower is finally louder than John’s heart, the pulse in his ears settling somewhat as he watches Sherlock tilt his head back into the stream. Water vines down his face, past his strong nose and cheekbones, flattening his curls and wetting his eyelashes. John is caught for a moment. Follows the movement of tiny rivers across Sherlock’s collarbone and down his marred chest, over the jut of his hipbones and then beneath, to a dark spattering of pubic hair.
John looks, combs the fringe off his own face and then reaches the same hand to Sherlock’s cock. Pulls him forwards gently out of the stream of water and watches Sherlock’s eyes flutter closed. Sees the breath hitch in his throat and release again through parted lips, as the day swirls away down the drain.
The tile squeaks as Sherlock flattens his hand against it, trying to find purchase while John’s palm works around him. Those eyes are still closed so John moves closer, kisses his sternum and neck and face and lips, Sherlock’s mouth open and wet as their tongues slide together. John feels his own cock, trapped between them, brush Sherlock’s thigh, achingly close to the hand hanging limp there.
But Sherlock doesn’t touch him again, and John doesn’t care much in this moment. Those moans are rolling from Sherlock’s throat still, echoing against the ceramic, increasing the pace of John’s wrist and sharpening the trail of his teeth at Sherlock’s neck.
And it’s easy. Much easier than he thought – because he knows this man, knows what he wants, if he really thinks about it. The same thing John wants. Everything, all at once. To be alive and in pain and in joy all at the same time, to find relief and then know, finally, that he is needed, more than anyone else.
So, John gives that to him. Lets his other hand fall to the round of Sherlock’s arse, digs his nails in until Sherlock hisses, goes faster and firmer along the length of his cock until he feels him quivering and then stops – holds Sherlock’s gaze as his eyes fly open and he gasps, the look on his face wicked and disbelieving and caught somewhere John wishes he could be, always.
One breath, two, and then he moves again. Squeezes lightly at Sherlock’s cheeks, strokes his palm up and down slowly this time. Teases that bottom lip softly and sweetly until Sherlock pulls his head back and cries out, John’s name right there in his mouth but silent, lost in a high.
Goosebumps prickle John’s skin, the steam warm yet not enough to quell the chill that shakes through him, the stark reality that is now theirs. The low light picks up the hairs on John’s arms and the sight of Sherlock’s naked body, trembling slightly where his forehead meets John’s shoulder. Whatever regret John should feel – that the world and his own self sabotaging mind has told him he should feel – does not come. He’s still hard and full of all the things he was moments ago, wants it even more now the spell of trauma is dissipating.
Seven of the longest seconds John has ever counted go by before Sherlock looks at him again. Does not break eye contact as he touches him, turns and pushes John by the hips until his back hits freezing tile.
“I want every part of you” Sherlock says into the shell of his ear, teasing the head of John’s cock with the flat of his thumb. “John –”
There it is, his name, finally.
“John” He repeats, those deft fingers finding the short hairs at John’s nape and tugging.
He’ll be purple and blue and green tomorrow. The canvas of his neck will be painted all kinds of colours – but John does not mind at all. If everyone knows that Sherlock has had him wet and desperate in the bathroom at Baker Street, then so be it.
Fuck it.
Fuck it all off, because it feels too good – Sherlock, feels so good – his teeth biting and tongue soothing, being consumed by him as he has from the beginning. It feels right. So much more right than John had ever imagined it could be.
“God, Sherlock –”
Synonyms now, while John is thrusting his hips into Sherlock’s fist, knocking his skull back against the tile while lips ruin his neck.
“All this time –”
John’s knees are shaking and his words too, but he manages to let go of the wall to find Sherlock’s face, pulls him down until their foreheads meet and their lungs become one again.
“All this fucking time” John says into Sherlock’s mouth, the hand between his legs quickly bringing him to the inevitable edge.
When he breaks over it, Sherlock moans with him, echoes every breath panting from John’s lips. His palms are still resting either side of Sherlock’s wet face, thumbs tracing the cut of his cheekbones. John kisses him, the tip of his nose and the space above his cupid’s bow, soft eyelashes that have fluttered closed with exertion.
Sherlock’s head slides away eventually and comes to rest on the wall above John’s shoulder, hands curling around his back. They stay like that for a while, John puffing air across the horizon of Sherlock’s collarbone, fingertips dancing across the raised skin patterning the back of his ribs.
“I still need a shower” John says, breaking the silence.
The lungs beneath his hands jump a little as Sherlock laughs quietly, pushes off the wall to look at him.
“Yes, you do” He agrees, wrinkling his brow in mock disgust.
“Cheeky,” John smiles, laughing a bit too, even though his mind is buzzing and crashing and still not quite believing where he’s stood. “I’m using your fancy body wash”
Eyes crawl down John’s frame as Sherlock moves out of the way, hums as if he doesn’t give a shit if John uses the entire bottle. With anyone else he might feel uneasy, but John matches the gaze turned his way while he steps back under the hot stream of water. Uses both hands to scrape the hair from his face and watches Sherlock looking – rolling his lips together in consideration, taking in every detail, slowly, as if he may never get another chance.
Finally scrubbing the lingering smell of earth from his skin feels good. Sherlock’s wash is cedar and sandalwood with an edge of something sweet, and it lathers much better than John’s cheap Radox. He soaps it under his arms and across his chest, between his legs and all the places Sherlock’s hands have been. Hopes he is not washing off the last of him – that there will be more, tomorrow or the day after or just one day, any day. He will wait.
Sherlock takes the bottle from him as he offers it, rolls his eyes as John steals his shampoo too, squeezes an overly large amount of it into his palms and then through his hair. Hot water soothes his scalp and back, the length of his neck now more sensitive than it was before. John stretches it out, knows Sherlock’s teeth are there, the imprint of his lips where the muscle connects to his shoulder.
“I’m sorry” Sherlock says softly, abandoning the body wash to step towards him.
“It’s –”
John tries, but Sherlock’s mouth is there again, touching gently this time, feathering kisses along damaged skin. He closes his eyes, the waterfall of heat and Sherlock’s body being so close again making him forget what language is. What words are and what he was about to use them for.
“I don’t mind it” John settles for, remembering how to speak only when Sherlock moves again, squeezing beside him to rinse the suds from his chest.
“There’s a lot you don’t mind”
Sherlock turns off the faucet and John’s instantly cold again, the absence of plumes of steam and skin against his own is noticeable.
“When it comes to you, yeah” He agrees, following Sherlock out of the tub and taking an offered towel, blissfully warmed from the radiator.
Something sad blooms across Sherlock’s face, and John isn’t sure why. Wets his bottom lip and reaches out fingers to Sherlock’s elbow.
“I just meant –”
He stumbles, closes his eyes and tries another circulation of oxygen. Restarts.
“Every part,” John clarifies, drifting his touch down Sherlock’s side and to the towel hanging on his hips. “I want every part, too”
Sherlock’s lids close for a second and then the look is gone, something warm and satisfied in its place again. Long fingers cover his own and Sherlock kisses him, leans in just like he had in the living room, in the shower, even though the spike of adrenaline is over and there are no boundaries left to break. John presses back, marvels at how quickly he has become used to the taste of his mouth.
This close John notices the red, the rawness under Sherlock’s eyes and remembers how little rest they’ve had. That they haven’t slept properly for days, not eaten for forty-eight hours and haven’t had much better than some dish water tea for nearly a day.
Before John can voice this realisation, Sherlock steps away. Moves into the bedroom – into his bedroom, with his unmade sheets and ghost of his form, there, singular on the mattress.
“I need to sleep” Sherlock says, the husk of his tone confirming the statement.
John hovers at the threshold. The light feels strange and too bright suddenly, exposing the wrinkles on his face and the doubt there too.
“With you,” Sherlock turns to him, brow raised in concern. “If that wasn’t clear”
The corner of John’s mouth upturns briefly, and he nods. Hums and tightens the towel at his waist, while Sherlock abandons his and slips beneath the duvet.
A part of John still tries to keep him stuck there, rooted to the spot. He shouldn’t be here, not really. Everything up until this point has been shoving him in another direction, trying to cast them out far across that endless water away from each other, rope be damned.
Only he’s holding on firmly this time. John’s hands are bloodied and burned from twisting the rope in his grip – but he’s got it. He’s found it again. In the sure press of Sherlock’s lips, and the truth birthing from his mouth to John’s own.
There’s a fight with the duvet. Sherlock’s sheets are like silk, maybe actually are, and cling to every part of his body like static. John lies on his back and realises Sherlock is too, and they’re not touching, and that just isn’t good enough. Then he tries to turn, leaning over on his shoulder, except he’s on the wrong side of the bed, so the wound there that still gives him grief now and again, protests.
“Sorry” He winces, noticing Sherlock’s patient face. “Haven’t, um – shared a bed, for a long time”
John settles on his back again, blows out an exasperated sigh.
“I never have” Sherlock confesses.
Sun crests over the line of Sherlock’s shoulder. Shadows pool in the recesses of his muscles, along his neck and jaw, to the honesty of his downturned eyes. John breathes in, steadies the ripple of pain that sings through his heart. Whether by choice or circumstance, Sherlock has always been alone. Has never had this, what John has so easily found his entire life.
Slowly, John stands. Pads over to the other side of the bed, naked in the morning light, and gestures for Sherlock to move up. He’s on his back again, but this time it’s not so painful when he stretches his right arm out, creating space for a taller frame to fit into.
After a moment, Sherlock moves. Carefully shapes long limbs against John’s own, rests his head on the fleshy part between John’s shoulder and pectorals.
Maybe he should make a joke about cuddling. Lighten the air that feels heavy once again. The words are almost there on the tip of John’s tongue, but then Sherlock exhales. And in that breath, John knows something has fallen away. Realises there’s no need to pretend, anymore, that this wasn’t the end game all along. The conclusion, after every other problem has been solved.
The anchor, so they can slowly pull their way back to each other across that vast sea.
.