Sherlock: Starting Again

[awanderingbard]

Title: Starting Again
Characters: John, Sherlock
Rating: R
Warnings/Triggers: much cursing, a few references to PTSD
Pairings: John/Mary (mentioned)
Spoilers: The Empty Hearse
Word Count 2,389
Summary: John and Sherlock have a heart to heart.
Author's notes: [Notes are Series Three spoilery] I've seen a few blog posts around about how Sherlock never actually explains to John why

Comments

[awanderingbard]

John's not so much persuaded by Sherlock's explanation as just appreciative that he finally gave one.

Oh, good! I was worried about that. I didn't want him just to be 'yeah, okay, sounds cool' (which, to be fair, is pretty much what canon!Watson does in the original stories) but I did want him to sort of accept that this is what Sherlock thought he was doing, and maybe that's not understandable, but perhaps forgivable in time.

He's not trying to be a jerk; he just has no idea how he should behave, or what John actually needs (I love the thing about the fevers, with bonus reference to Victorian times!).

I think Sherlock is sincere about what he says on the train, and his pretending to die isn't real, as he knows he's disarmed the bomb, but the sentiment is real. And the laughing and mocking is a desperate attempt to cover up that he was being sentimental. I think the mocking is not calculated cruelty, it's Sherlock trying to get John to think it wasn't as important to him as it was. It's not the right thing to do by any means, but it's not meant to be...horrible in Sherlock's head.

It's the same as him insulting Molly at the Christmas party; that's not Sherlock thinking 'I'm going to insult Molly now', that's Sherlock going 'I don't like this, I'm uncomfortable, I don't know what to do, I don't want to be here, oh look Molly is here, I'll deduce her, that is a comfortable thing to do'. It doesn't make it okay, but it's not done with any calculation to wound, IMO. It's Sherlock failing at people.