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How would you know?
When everything around you is changing like the weather,
A big black storm.
And who would you turn to?
Or hide a ghost, a shadow at the most, would you let me know?
-Ben Howard, "Gracious"
So this is where I’ve ended up, in a woman’s sitting room of a very grand estate in the country. I’m not really one for waiting, but I seem to spend a lot of time doing it.
It’s nice here, really. Bit quiet. This ivory-painted and gilt chair faces a painting - well, the whole room faces that painting. It’s impossible to ignore.
From that painting, I can tell she’s not what I expected (though I don’t know what I expected). She’s got Sherlock’s iciness, but none of his color. Maybe a hint of him, around the cheekbones. She’s him, softened into Mycroft’s coloring. Or maybe he’s her, sharpened into strangeness. I don’t know what sort of painter would paint a woman looking at the viewer with such naked power, but that painter must have known the Holmes family well. You sense a great mind working behind those keen eyes, you feel judged.
I look away from such a judgement, from such open manipulation. This sitting room is a sort of chapel, a shrine to Sherlock’s mother, Aurelia. There are other pictures here, even a small one of his father. I see Sherlock there too, muted and heavy. The dark hair carefully tamed into shape, like some sort of bygone-era movie star. The startling eyes. No wonder he was popular with women. Like Sherlock he sets off a small pinging in the back of the heart: danger, danger, rocks ahead.
I shift, slide a bit on the silk cushion. Everything in here screams old money, but Sherlock assured me it isn’t. Another illusion created to upset and unbalance. To distribute power in one direction.
Sherlock’s already off balance. And I can’t right him. He stayed up late last night with me, telling me about her. He wanted to prepare me, I think. But I feel like it was too much, or too little. Maybe I’m off balance too.
Being told by a social secretary that your mate’s mother will see you before her next obligation is certainly meant to impress upon you how terribly important she is.
I feel a brief flash of regret I didn’t take that cup of tea when it was on offer. Didn’t think I’d be waiting so long. I’m sure there’s something ridiculous, like a bell I could pull to summon a servant, or I could use that posh bronze and bakelite confection of a phone and someone from downstairs would pick up. It is getting late, after all. He’s been in there with her for ages.
As if me thinking it somehow made it happen, a maid (in uniform, seriously!) came in with a tea tray on a trolley. It’s a fine set, and I see there are three cups. Doesn’t take a lot of deducing to figure where this is going.
I give her a small smile and she mostly ignores me, too focused on the tray of tea things. She gives a quick, polite knock, then wheels in without waiting for an answer. Quiet voices hush. Two voices, the low thunder of Sherlock’s, a silvery sweet laugh.
I stand. Wish, briefly, that I’d brought my gun.
The maid, a girl, really, comes out, the trolley bare of the tray. Her dark hair falls neatly to her shoulders. She flashes me a look I can’t quite understand, mumbles something about being ready, tea, directs me in.
I walk in, curious, and she shuts the door behind me.
A beautiful bedroom, lit softly in amber. Like the sitting room, done in mostly ivory and gold, with accents of rich color. An ancient canopied bed. A small table, circled with three feminine armchairs, more delicate versions of the ones outside. Sherlock’s there, half in shadow, perched in one of those chairs. There is tension in his jaw. He must be at risk of cracking a molar.
Sitting on a neat, low bench, at an ornate dressing table framed with more soft amber lights is a woman that could only be called stately. Her posture is impeccable, especially for her age. A neat bob of pure white hair. A handsome face, strong features. Those keen eyes. She’s dressed in deep blue, a prim dress and jacket. Like something the prime minister’s wife would wear.
She is holding a tube of lipstick in her hands, staring into the mirror. It glints gold in her hand, matches her several exceptionally fine, heavy rings. Those eyes fix on me in the mirror, watching me come in.
“Sherlock,” her voice calls, light with laughter; teasing. In her day, she must have driven men wild indeed. “I can’t believe I have to tell you the same thing I told your father.” A smirk on her lips, must be a family trait. I have my company smile on. Not the same at all. Out of the corner of my eye, I see him glance in my direction.
A laugh, from her. Then her voice like chips of broken ice.
“I mean, really, how many times did I tell him? Don’t. fuck. the. help.”
Blimey. What?
The language, the tone. It’s all wrong.
In a moment, I feel my face fall, and my brain’s already ready for a retort. I’ve been dueling (though, badly on my part) with Mycroft for some time. A half-formed response on how theories about distant, cold mothers end up with homosexual sons is already on my lips when Sherlock’s voice razors across the room.
“Mother!”
It has an edge, that growl. Something dangerous and animal right behind it.
And instantly, it’s gone. She gets up and turns in my direction, her hand outstretched. An amused expression plays across her face.
“Oh, do forgive an old lady having a laugh!”
I compose my own face into something lighter, too. A snort, like a laugh. I don’t like this. I shake her smooth, powdery hand.
“Please!” She says, directing me to a seat. “We’ll have tea! I’ve been positively dying to meet you, but Sherlock keeps you all to himself in the city, doesn’t he?”
“Come by any time when you’re in our neighborhood, Mother.” Sherlock's drawls sarcastically, “You do get up often enough to your place in London, but you never seem to call.”
“Oh,” she says, dismissing him with a wave. “It’s all work, work, work! I hardly have time to think. I’m sure you know how it is.” She gives me a conspiratorial wink. A nervous laugh from me.
Sherlock’s hands are moving too much. Fiddling with his nails, gripping his knee, the buttons on his shirt. The cup of tea gives him something to focus on. My chest begins to burn. I don’t like him like this. His eyes are blank, flicking from place to place. He avoids my face.
She is gracious, beyond gracious: charming. But beneath every compliment, a barb. Subtle, smooth ones. Designed to take Sherlock down, to cripple him in the conversation, so that he’s unable to respond. He loses footing every time he speaks.
“And Mycroft tells me you’re absolutely determined to continue on with this amateur detective work.”
Another smirk in place of a smile, a second cup of this tea: deep, smoky and spiked with floral. Seems fitting.
Sherlock shows no sign of giving in, but never loses the gravel in his voice. It shows how carefully he’s holding himself, how tightly coiled. What did she say before I got here?
Every time I’ve had enough of it, every time a sharp word nearly reaches my tongue, Sherlock’s eyes are on me. Pleading: no. I won’t go against him in his house. It sets my teeth on edge.
When she looks away, when she glances at me, he looks down. Dominated. Beaten down, somehow. But he thinks she can’t see. Thinks she only sees the stone face he shows her. Oh, Sherlock. People think you are so cold. How you must have burned and choked in a family like this: truly frozen.
Whatever this ghastly charade is, I want no part in it. And time is on my side (for once). A baroque nightmare of a clock shows the hour of Mrs Holmes departure is nearly upon us.
Sherlock stands.
“Wouldn’t want to keep you, Mother.”
She uncrosses her ankles, stands beside him.
“Oh, thank you so much for coming, my dear,” From her tone of voice, you’d guess she was the grandmother we’d ignored, tucked her in a home somewhere and forgotten to visit. She tilts her cheek up to Sherlock. He bends and kisses the air before it, a quick half-hug. Stiff, mechanical. Like a toy soldier.
I follow behind him, I want to touch him. At least pat his shoulder. Reach him through the mask. But I don’t, he couldn’t bear it if he cracked here. And I’m worried he’d turn on me, and the explosion rippling under his skin will consume me. He’d never do it on purpose. But when his emotions overwhelm him something not good happens.
I’m halfway out the door when she calls out.
“Oh, John? If you have a minute?”
He whirls on the spot, eyes wide, nostrils flaring. Ready to fight. A single breath in a huff, like he’s been hit in the chest. She can’t see - his long legs had already taken him halfway across the room. I put up my hand: Stop, Sherlock.
I give him a nod, a small smile. Go back inside, shut the door behind me.
“Thank you so much, I promise I only want a moment of your time.” She sounds truly grateful.
I sit back down, nod at her to continue.
And it’s all easy. It’s gently lobbed questions, concern about her son. Asking after the blog. She’s so warm and genuine I start to wonder if the tension and cruelty from before was an act. Maybe it’s how the Holmes family members protect themselves from each other. Because make no mistake, she is Sherlock and Mycroft’s mother. Keen and direct, she quickly calls my attention to what she’s afraid of are mistakes in my accounts. Most of them are fictionalizations I’ve invented to protect our clients. Some are more...complex. Things she knew were fictionalized to protect people turned out to be in conflict with their later behaviors. I’d made poor decisions. But she said such creative, kind things about my writing. About our work. She wanted to know so much detail, we walked through Sherlock’s process on several cases. She laughed when I told her the funny stories, gasped at the danger. But it was like watching an actress in a master class. The emotion never reached those watchful eyes.
So much time passed I started to wonder if she was going to miss her dinner. I hoped Sherlock was alright.
And of course, she asked after Sherlock. Directly. How he was doing, what he was doing. And I recognized Mycroft in her then. As if a few compliments and a grandmotherly manner were enough to get me to tell things he clearly didn’t want spoken. It felt strange, at first I was able to redirect her gently, defer to Sherlock. Then the questions became more direct. Did he need money? Was he cared for? Did he sleep well? Did he eat enough? Where did he go at nights? And my answers were just as direct. “If you’d like to talk about those sorts of things, you’ll have to ask him.”
And she was done with me. A kiss in the direction of my cheek. An awkward half-hug. While her head was near my shoulder she said in a hiss, grabbing on hard to my upper arm:
“You know he’s already had one. Just like you.”
I pull my head back, startled at her tone. Venom and honey.
“Just. like. you. Ask him, then, what happened to the Corliss boy.”
Her hand is a claw on my arm. I wonder if she’ll leave bruises. I wrench it away.
We’ve been talking too long, I can’t conceal my anger any longer. I feel my face set, know my eyes are narrowed. I feel calm and ready as I do when facing danger. Things are slowing down. I have time to speak, to act. But I remember Sherlock’s face. The flash of hurt as she looked away from him. The tiny microexpressions that spoke, practically screamed: suffering.
I turned on my heel and never looked back.
*
Nearly ran into the girl who’d come to collect the tea things. She stopped me, questions about what wine I’d want with dinner. When I tried to brush her off, she tried to explain the differences between one year, or one maker or something I couldn’t be bothered with. I thought she’d cry when I practically bounded out.
I’ve no idea how long it took me to get turned right way around, too long by far. Nerves all afire; why didn’t he wait for me? Thinking he went to meet me, I go back to my room. Empty.
So many hallways here, so long. Like a maze. I make the turn down the hallway I visited only once, to see his childhood room.
Something grips me there, I know he’d say it was that I was picking up on subtle clues. I don’t know. It was a sense of danger, a sense of worry so deep in my bones that shook me.
“Sherlock?”
Silence. A smell like copper at the back of my throat.
Every cylinder is firing. The panic response that drives most people to their knees clicks on; it steadies me instead.
The door isn’t closed all the way.
I push it open, the world shifts into slow motion as I process that husky drawing sound as breathing.
Wrong. Everything. Wrong.
Oh god. No.
Please, not this.
(More blood than there should be?)
What?
The Pieta. No, wrong. Stupid brain looks for patterns. This time there’s only one figure.
On his knees; head thrown back.
Agony of ecstasy.
Too much blood.
He’s on his knees, pale arms thrown down, (in supplication?) leaning against a wall (for support). Small leather case, contents strewn before him. Hypodermic. Belt around his arm. Wrenching his head towards me, glacial blue practically invisible, subsumed by huge, dark pupils.
His hands are still shaking. That explains the several puncture marks. Inexpertly done.
“John.”
My name lasts forever on his lips. I hear a breath. Is it mine?
A loose blade, sliding down fine wool trousers. Why? A thin red line, waving down that long white forearm.
Not really dangerous, not deep, (not a suicide attempt) but there’s enough blood that it drips down, consistent, with each heartbeat.
What?
“John, I couldn’t find a vein.” His jaw works against the words, spits them out.
Kneeling next to him. How did I get here? Don’t remember taking the steps from the door to here.
I have seen terrible wounds, seen the damage we do to each other at our worst. But not this, not the damage we can do to ourselves. In the back of my head: Ah, fuck. After so many years clean.
My hand at his throat, for a pulse. He’s on fire.
“Obviously, you did.”
Wide eyes struggle to focus on my face, flicking around and around me, the room, my clothes.
“What?”
“Find a vein. Obviously, you did.”
Heart’s racing. Of course.
Push the kit away, the hypodermic rolls. Peel the blade from his trousers; it’s wet. He laughs, the sound is like an icepick (cold and sharp).
So this is what dying feels like. Your lover on the floor, saying “I had to think!” to explain the needle, the slash down his arm.
“Yes, of course.”
“I can’t think around her. I can’t think.”
He starts talking, I’m not listening. I’m mentally reviewing everything I know about intravenous cocaine use. Another part of my brain is shocked, he hasn’t done so much as smoke a cigarette in ages.
I stand him up, directing him with the arm that isn’t bleeding. He leans against the wall, his face and expressions wildly exaggerated as he speaks. I ignore him; it takes great effort. I loosen and slide the belt from his arm. Hitting the floor, it made a sound that still gives me chills.
“No, stop.” I tell him, quietly. He eyes me, suspicious. I wish, desperately, that I had a blood pressure cuff. When I ask him if it was just cocaine, he looks at me as if I’ve done something dramatic and mad.
“It’s cocaine, John, it’s just...don’t look so worried.” A scoff. “It's not like I haven't done this before. It’s perfectly under control.”
I steered him towards the bathroom. Sit him on the edge of the tub. In the bright light of the bathroom, I can see the long cut down his arm has already slowed, is nearly done bleeding. I start to unbutton his shirt.
Talking a mile a minute, about me, about a case we’ve solved months ago, he reels off common household chemicals and cleaners that can be used as weapons, and how. I don’t know where I am, but it feels like his voice is barely reaching me from underwater.
Then he realizes my hands are on him and he stops.
“Oh, John.” He breathes, grabbing my hand and pulling it downwards and me towards him. Darkened eyes sparking, eyebrows lifted. He starts to pull me in for a kiss, his ghastly, bloody torn arm brushing against my face as his hands wind in my hair.
The look on my face must have been unmistakable. He lets me pull away and I start to run the bath. Tells me it’s quite possible that we should try having sex while he’s taken cocaine so we can see what it’s like. Experiment.
I shake my head, I don’t think I can trust my voice. Guide him to standing. If we’d been in a hospital, they would have cooled him with icepacks, cooling blankets. I take off his tailored shirt. It falls to the ground, the last drops of blood from his arm catch on it.
He smirks, looking down at me. Cocks his hip to one side.
“Yesssss?” he drawls, a caricature of a mockery of sexiness. I swallow back a rising tide of shock and nausea. I say nothing, only run my hand under the cool water of the bath.
“God, it’s blazing in here!” he exclaims as he starts to unbutton his trousers. Slips off his socks.
“Are we taking a bath?” he asks, a laugh playing at the edges of his voice.
“Get in,” I say, harder than I intended. He stops, leans towards me. Cups my face in his hands. Gently turns my face towards his.
“It’s better this way, John. I’m better this way.”
“No. Get in.” I say again. Fear has quickly run to anger. I hold on to anger because behind it is an explosion of worry, and then fear again. Fear that will smother me, dash all the air from the room.
He listens, lowers himself into the cool bath. Moans with pleasure. I know that in a moment it’ll be too cold, but it’s that way to keep him cool, keep him from drug-induced hyperthermia (I hope?).
He talks to me as I gather some things, wrap his kit in his shirt, wrap that in a bin liner. I take the water glass from beside the sink and toss it to the ground beside the small pool of blood. It shatters neatly.
He snorts, interrupting a too-loud retelling of some excellent lab results he got a few weeks ago, despite the poor growth medium he was forced to use.
“That’s idiotic, no one, not even Anderson would be fooled by that.” I thank the gods that cocaine is short-acting. His voice is losing that over-brightness.
I hear a bit of a splash, he’s relaxing down in the water, curled sideways. “God, this just feels so right, like everything’s so easy to put on the correct shelf, in the correct place.”
I pick up the phone on the bedside table. Stare at it stupidly for a moment. There’s no tone. Then a voice, it’s cool and practiced.
“Yes, Mr. Holmes?”
Swallow hard.
“Um, no this is John Watson, Doctor Watson. Sherl - Mister Holmes has cut himself and it’s a bit of a mess up here. Would you mind sending someone up in about fifteen minutes?”
“Of course, sir, should I phone A&E to expect you?”
I dismiss their concern, then ask again for several minutes. There’s someone knocking at the door in about five. It’s the same poor girl I nearly knocked over earlier. I’ve taken the precaution of closing the door to the bathroom. After handing her the stained shirt, already wrapped in the bin liner, she chucks it with the other bloody towels in the bin. I shut myself inside with Sherlock, telling her I was seeing to his cut.
He was sitting on the edge of the tub, soaking, not even a towel around him. He shivered violently. He didn’t look up as I walked to the shelf beside him. Water pooled at his feet, plastering his dark hair to his face and neck. I take two towels from the stack and walk to him, standing in front of him, though he still doesn’t look up at me. I wrap a towel around his shoulders; it’s almost like holding him. I could touch him.
And like that, I’m wiped clean by anger and worry. The adrenaline has faded, and I’m wrecked. We’d spent the day walking the grounds, the surrounding wild wood, then the appalling meeting with his mother. Then seeing him like that, a pool of blood.
I falter, briefly. I’m not sure what was making it’s way out of me - an angry shout, a plea, a cry, but it died in my throat. Too late, I cover my mouth with my hand. Oh,whathaveIdone? I shut my eyes. I could not have imagined this. Stars burst in the darkness behind my closed eyes.
A gentle tug at my jumper. I look down, his hand a pale fist in the dark wool.
“You knew this was going to happen.” I say, my voice shaking with the accusation, cracking with anger. I won’t look at his face. My own face hurts, suddenly, from struggling to keep it still all this evening.
“No.” He says firmly, starting to wrap a damp arm around me. I stand back, push his arm from me.
“No.” he says again, looking up. I want to hold him. I want to shout at him. I want to tell him to get his things ready, we’re leaving now. I want to make him see how finding him like that has nearly undone me. I want to make a joke about how his mother would drive me to drugs and drink too.
He looks at me and he knows. So he says “I know.” He is nearly back to normal. His face deadly pale, eyes ringed with red. He stands, wraps the second towel around his waist. Cream and marble and snowy white. And angry red on his arms. He takes the single step to me; I’m pressed against the tile wall.
He moves slowly, thinking I’ll shake him off again. I think I might.
And how would you know?
When everything around you's bruised and battered
Like the cold night storm.
And who would you turn to?