After the Falls
Title: After the Falls (1/1), inspired by the original ACD story "The Adventure of the Empty House"
Series: BBC Sherlock
Word count: 2,666
Category: Friendship/Slash
Rating: G
Summary: Sherlock Holmes has been dead seven months and two days. Or has he?
Once again, I have to thank verityburns for both her encouragement and her time. Her critique of this piece took it from "meh" to something I'm well pleased with.
The elderly man sitting across from me in my surgery had just about found my last nerve. He was refusing to be examined and was insisting that I figure out what was wrong with him based solely on a verbal description. This, in and of itself, was irritating enough but said verbal description was taking the form of an endless, rambling catalogue of symptoms and all the many circumstances under which they presented themselves. At this point, it might have taken less time for him to tell me what *didn't* cause him some sort of discomfort.
"Mr…" (I glanced at the chart given me by the nurse) "Helmos," I interrupted the ongoing drone. "The description of your symptoms is useful, but if you won't let me at least perform a basic exam, I can only be of so much help to you."
The man scrutinized me for a long moment. He was about my height; in his younger years, however, before bending under the weight of age, he had no doubt been several inches taller. He was dressed in clothing too large for him, including an overcoat that seemed too warm for the weather. He had gray, wiry hair and a beard. His eyes were blue, very pale and very bright. There was something oddly familiar about them. Helmos. I wondered briefly if he were Greek.
"Very well, young man," Mr. Helmos declared. "I will submit to your examination."
I gave a sigh of relief. Finally, we were getting somewhere. I turned away to retrieve swabs, alcohol wipes, and a sterile tip for my otoscope. Behind me, I could hear the shuffle of clothing being shed.
"No need to get undressed just yet, Mr. Helmos," I said. "I'll step out and let you get into a gown."
When I turned back, my patient was gone. And standing in his place was Sherlock Holmes. Or, at least, someone who looked like Sherlock Holmes. He wore the clothes of the stooped man who had, a moment before, been testing my patience, but in all other respects, he was the man I had come to think of as my partner. Tall, long limbed. Dark curly hair and blazing eyes staring out of a pale, thin face. It was Sherlock. But it could not be. Because Sherlock Holmes was, in fact, dead. Dead for seven months, two days. I had stopped counting hours and minutes, if only in an effort to hold on to some shred of sanity.
I had enough coherency left, as the edges of my vision began to blur and a rush of white noise filled my head, to consider that those efforts had clearly failed. And then, for the first time before or since, I fainted.
Now, let me be clear. I've been shot. And beaten up. Badly. And I have, in fact, passed out. Drink, a knock to the head, and nearly the pain from the aforementioned gunshot. (Sadly, I did not pass out during that last, though it was touch and go for a bit.) But nothing has ever made me lose consciousness without any direct physical cause.
But this... my brain couldn't accept what my eyes were seeing. I had gone to this man's funeral. I had wept more tears than ever before in my life -- I'm not much of a cryer, so that's saying something -- and more than I ever hope to again. I had lost weight and sleep. And I still grieved. And now, apparently, I could add "fainting" to the list.
"John…" the figure who looked like Sherlock said and started to move around the examining table toward me; his voice sounded weirdly distant and muffled by the whooshing of the ocean filling my ears.
***
When my vision began to return, who knows how much later, there was that same thin face hovering above me. The face that should not - could not - be there. A cold cloth - paper towels? - had been placed on my forehead and a pillow had been put under my head. Where in the world had a pillow come from? The man was on his knees beside me, the overcoat he'd been wearing now gone. Ah, I thought, that must be the "pillow."
"John," the man kept saying my name, and as he came into focus, I registered his pale blue eyes - the eyes I had recognized in the old man's face without knowing why - regarding me with concern. One slender hand came down to rest against my cheek, supporting my head. "John, are you with me? Can you hear me?"
That voice. Deep, sinewy. Almost incongruous coming from within a chest so thin. Saying my name. It was his voice. It could not be. But it was.
"Sherlock?" I asked, incredulous.
"Yes, John." And I could hear the relief. "It is. I'm here."
I started up abruptly, completely misjudging his proximity and nearly bashing my forehead into his, followed by an abrupt loss of motor control. Disoriented, I began to fall backwards. An arm shot out and wrapped around me, lowering me back to the floor, bringing that face within inches of my own.
There was no mistake. It was Sherlock. The hair was longer, shaggier. The eyes were shadowed by dark circles and, though I would not have believed it possible, the cheekbones were more pronounced. Whatever he had been doing for the past seven months, it clearly did not include living a life of comfort and ease.
"John," he began, "You are not insane. And you are not hallucinating." (Well, the ability to read my mind certainly seemed promising.) He had retreated slightly and seemed unsure of what to do next. It occurred to me that this was not an outcome he had anticipated.
I stared at him, taking in every line and feature. The almond eyes, the long yet blunt-tipped nose, the vaguely heart-shaped lips. And then, I did the thing I had wanted to do for seven months, two days. The thing that had filled my few sleeping hours nearly every night since his death, leaving me with ragged breath and stinging eyes when I inevitably woke. I grabbed his shirt and pulled him the rest of the way down, crushing my lips to his. His hands smacked to the floor on either side of my head to keep from crashing down on me, but he returned my kiss without hesitation. The tactile sensation of kissing him, so familiar, so absolute in its rightness pushed away the last lingering doubts in my mind. It was him. My heart filled with joy, squeezing out the grief and replacing it with a cascade of feelings - hope, love, relief, desire… and anger.
This last washed over me suddenly and intensely. How could he have done this to me? How could he have left me? I broke the kiss abruptly, surprising him. He looked at me quizzically. "John?"
"You complete bastard," I spat out, sitting back up and pushing him off me with both hands as I went. The shock and regret on his face as he fell back nearly undid me, but my hurt was too great. "What the hell have you been playing at the last seven months? You died. You went over the Falls. You and Moriarty. I went to your funeral. Do you know what I've gone through?" I am not a man given to hysteria. I kept my voice low, but it wavered nonetheless. "Do you know what my life has been, Sherlock? Do you?"
He sighed heavily. I could see I had utterly confused him. He was unsure now whether to touch me or not, though he clearly wanted to.
"John, believe me, had I seen any other way…" his voice trailed off. He passed a hand over his eyes, and the exhaustion was evident. Despite my absolute frustration with him, I reached out and took his other hand. The slightest of smiles passed over his lips, but his expression was otherwise rueful and sad.
"I did go over the Falls," he began, "As did Moriarty. And to be honest, I thought I was done. But I landed on a ledge some 15 feet down. Moriarty was not so fortunate." Sherlock's lips pressed together momentarily in an expression of grim satisfaction, and then he went on. "I gave my ankle a good twist, but I was more or less unhurt. But I couldn't stay there, obviously. Moriarty wasn't a threat any longer, but you and I both know that he never acted alone. There were others I had to concern myself with. Not many, and not quite as clever, but just as brutal and just as persistent. And they would not be pleased to hear of his death. Or, more to the point, of my role in his death. It occurred to me that I had a chance to protect us both. If Moriarty's colleagues believed I was dead, it could only help me. They would relax. Make mistakes." He paused. "And they would have no reason to come after you."
"Come after me?" I asked, perplexed. "Why would they do that?"
"John," he said, shaking his head, a tinge of exasperation colouring his voice, "Even if Moriarty's lackeys failed to grasp the nature of our relationship, they knew you were - are - important to me. If there was any indication I'd survived the Falls, even if I'd gone into hiding, they would have come after you to get to me. Do I really need to remind you of the night you spent wrapped in explosives beside a swimming pool?"
It was, of course, obvious. I blamed my recent unconsciousness on my slowness in seeing it.
"How did you survive?" I asked, genuine curiosity overtaking the hurt.
"I climbed," he replied dismissively. "No other option, really. And then I ran. Or rather limped. That was a bother. Slowed me down considerably. With the money I had on me, I got myself to Prague. I couldn't risk using cards."
"Dead men don't use credit cards," I agreed.
"Just so," he responded, absently rubbing his thumb over the ball of my hand, an affectionate habit that I suddenly realized I had missed tremendously. "I wired Mycroft for money once I was in a safe place."
I nodded. That made sense. Wait…
"Mycroft knew?!" I nearly shouted, the anger racing through me again. Of course he knew, that smug bastard. How else would Sherlock have been able to survive? And here I'd thought his lack of obvious signs of grief over his brother's death was merely stoicism. The strained nature of their relationship served to bolster the illusion. Though when I thought back over the past months, I remembered times when I had caught Mycroft looking at me with the strangest expression. Knowing now what had happened, that he was being forced to keep the truth from me, I supposed it was something akin to regret. The realization that Mycroft might genuinely have regretted lying to me did not make me feel better.
I punched Sherlock in the chest with my free hand. Not as hard as I could, but hard enough. He looked at me pleadingly, "John…please, I didn't have a choice. I had to go to Mycroft. I needed money. I needed to know what was going on here. And I needed to know you were safe."
"You could have come to me," I said sharply. "You could have trusted me. Then you wouldn't have needed to go to Mycroft to know I was safe."
"I do trust you, John." He leaned forward, physically emphasizing his point. "But you are not a good liar. Mycroft…"
"Is a very good liar," I finished for him.
He chuckled and I glared. Though I could see where he was going, and I couldn't argue - I was a fairly bad liar - I hadn't finished being seriously angry with him.
His expression of contriteness and concern was back full force, and I forgave him -damn him - the moment of levity at his brother's expense.
"Yes, Mycroft is an exceptionally good liar. And that is what I needed. I needed for you to believe that I was dead. I didn't see how this could work otherwise. It wasn't a decision I made easily. I can't tell you how many times I started to text you. To write to you. Even call you. To explain why I'd disappeared. I didn't do this because I don't care about you, John. I did it because I do care. And I've missed you. More than you know."
I can't say I forgave him completely, but the sincerity in his voice was undeniable. I believed that he was convinced of his correctness, convinced that there truly had been no other way.
I wrapped my arms around him, straining from my seated position to pull him closer. Even kneeling, he was insultingly tall. I could almost feel the tension leave him as he reciprocated, rearranging himself to make the embrace more comfortable for me.
"I'm sorry, John," he said, his face firmly lodged in the space between my ear and shoulder. I tilted my head to accommodate him. "For today, and everything else, too. The disguise was unavoidable. But I didn't need to be so dramatic about it. It was…" He seemed to struggle to find the right words. A number of fine choices came to my mind, but I kept quiet. "A bit not good," he finished, adding a second later, "I had no idea you'd react so strongly."
"You are an idiot," I barked. "I thought you were dead. Did you think you could just show up and get a casual 'hello'?" My face was in his hair, the familiar smell and texture making it increasingly difficult to maintain the degree of outrage I felt the situation still warranted.
"No, no," he responded, "Of course not. But I didn't think you would…."
"Faint," I finished for him. "Have you had Mycroft keeping me under surveillance?"
"Of course," he responded, clearly unsure of what connection this could possibly have to the present conversation and equally oblivious to the fact that asking your brother to keep track of your partner while you pretend to be dead is not, for the general populace anyway, a foregone conclusion.
"And has he reported back to you on my state of mind? My activities? How I've been since your 'death'?"
"Yes," he replied gravely, tightening his arms around me. I could see he was beginning to understand my meaning.
"And you still didn't think you'd get much of a reaction if you came in here, fooled me into believing you were someone else - and you were unbelievably irritating, by the way - and then just… ta-da! Not dead."
I pulled away enough to be able to see his face, which, I was gratified to see, was genuinely chagrined.
"I'm so sorry, John," he repeated. "I wanted to see you. And I wanted to surprise you. I didn't… well, it was clearly not my best plan."
"I don't think you're going to want to file any of this under 'best practices,' no," I said, then added, "You know we have more to discuss. I need to know where you've been. What the hell you've been doing. Why you're back now. Are we in danger? I assume you have a plan. A *better* plan."
He nodded, accepting the ribbing with nothing more than a slight quirk of one brow, the most convincing proof I'd had thus far of his contrition. "I'll tell you everything. Anything you want to know." He looked at me, hesitancy battling with want on his tired face.
I shifted my arm so that his head slid back just slightly and kissed him. He smiled though the kiss and adjusted his body to gain a better position, moving his hand to the back of my head. The office and everything else on the other side of the surgery door be damned. I felt as if I, too, had returned from the dead and if this insane man in my arms thought I was going to let him out of my sight ever again… the impracticality of such thinking was immediately clear, but I did not care. I thought I had lost him forever and with him, a life worth living. Now he was back, hope and passion and possibility rushing in alongside.
Sherlock took his lips from mine suddenly. I was about to protest when he murmured, "Thank you, John."
"For what?" I asked.
"For missing me."
Series: BBC Sherlock
Word count: 2,666
Category: Friendship/Slash
Rating: G
Summary: Sherlock Holmes has been dead seven months and two days. Or has he?
Once again, I have to thank verityburns for both her encouragement and her time. Her critique of this piece took it from "meh" to something I'm well pleased with.
The elderly man sitting across from me in my surgery had just about found my last nerve. He was refusing to be examined and was insisting that I figure out what was wrong with him based solely on a verbal description. This, in and of itself, was irritating enough but said verbal description was taking the form of an endless, rambling catalogue of symptoms and all the many circumstances under which they presented themselves. At this point, it might have taken less time for him to tell me what *didn't* cause him some sort of discomfort.
"Mr…" (I glanced at the chart given me by the nurse) "Helmos," I interrupted the ongoing drone. "The description of your symptoms is useful, but if you won't let me at least perform a basic exam, I can only be of so much help to you."
The man scrutinized me for a long moment. He was about my height; in his younger years, however, before bending under the weight of age, he had no doubt been several inches taller. He was dressed in clothing too large for him, including an overcoat that seemed too warm for the weather. He had gray, wiry hair and a beard. His eyes were blue, very pale and very bright. There was something oddly familiar about them. Helmos. I wondered briefly if he were Greek.
"Very well, young man," Mr. Helmos declared. "I will submit to your examination."
I gave a sigh of relief. Finally, we were getting somewhere. I turned away to retrieve swabs, alcohol wipes, and a sterile tip for my otoscope. Behind me, I could hear the shuffle of clothing being shed.
"No need to get undressed just yet, Mr. Helmos," I said. "I'll step out and let you get into a gown."
When I turned back, my patient was gone. And standing in his place was Sherlock Holmes. Or, at least, someone who looked like Sherlock Holmes. He wore the clothes of the stooped man who had, a moment before, been testing my patience, but in all other respects, he was the man I had come to think of as my partner. Tall, long limbed. Dark curly hair and blazing eyes staring out of a pale, thin face. It was Sherlock. But it could not be. Because Sherlock Holmes was, in fact, dead. Dead for seven months, two days. I had stopped counting hours and minutes, if only in an effort to hold on to some shred of sanity.
I had enough coherency left, as the edges of my vision began to blur and a rush of white noise filled my head, to consider that those efforts had clearly failed. And then, for the first time before or since, I fainted.
Now, let me be clear. I've been shot. And beaten up. Badly. And I have, in fact, passed out. Drink, a knock to the head, and nearly the pain from the aforementioned gunshot. (Sadly, I did not pass out during that last, though it was touch and go for a bit.) But nothing has ever made me lose consciousness without any direct physical cause.
But this... my brain couldn't accept what my eyes were seeing. I had gone to this man's funeral. I had wept more tears than ever before in my life -- I'm not much of a cryer, so that's saying something -- and more than I ever hope to again. I had lost weight and sleep. And I still grieved. And now, apparently, I could add "fainting" to the list.
"John…" the figure who looked like Sherlock said and started to move around the examining table toward me; his voice sounded weirdly distant and muffled by the whooshing of the ocean filling my ears.
***
When my vision began to return, who knows how much later, there was that same thin face hovering above me. The face that should not - could not - be there. A cold cloth - paper towels? - had been placed on my forehead and a pillow had been put under my head. Where in the world had a pillow come from? The man was on his knees beside me, the overcoat he'd been wearing now gone. Ah, I thought, that must be the "pillow."
"John," the man kept saying my name, and as he came into focus, I registered his pale blue eyes - the eyes I had recognized in the old man's face without knowing why - regarding me with concern. One slender hand came down to rest against my cheek, supporting my head. "John, are you with me? Can you hear me?"
That voice. Deep, sinewy. Almost incongruous coming from within a chest so thin. Saying my name. It was his voice. It could not be. But it was.
"Sherlock?" I asked, incredulous.
"Yes, John." And I could hear the relief. "It is. I'm here."
I started up abruptly, completely misjudging his proximity and nearly bashing my forehead into his, followed by an abrupt loss of motor control. Disoriented, I began to fall backwards. An arm shot out and wrapped around me, lowering me back to the floor, bringing that face within inches of my own.
There was no mistake. It was Sherlock. The hair was longer, shaggier. The eyes were shadowed by dark circles and, though I would not have believed it possible, the cheekbones were more pronounced. Whatever he had been doing for the past seven months, it clearly did not include living a life of comfort and ease.
"John," he began, "You are not insane. And you are not hallucinating." (Well, the ability to read my mind certainly seemed promising.) He had retreated slightly and seemed unsure of what to do next. It occurred to me that this was not an outcome he had anticipated.
I stared at him, taking in every line and feature. The almond eyes, the long yet blunt-tipped nose, the vaguely heart-shaped lips. And then, I did the thing I had wanted to do for seven months, two days. The thing that had filled my few sleeping hours nearly every night since his death, leaving me with ragged breath and stinging eyes when I inevitably woke. I grabbed his shirt and pulled him the rest of the way down, crushing my lips to his. His hands smacked to the floor on either side of my head to keep from crashing down on me, but he returned my kiss without hesitation. The tactile sensation of kissing him, so familiar, so absolute in its rightness pushed away the last lingering doubts in my mind. It was him. My heart filled with joy, squeezing out the grief and replacing it with a cascade of feelings - hope, love, relief, desire… and anger.
This last washed over me suddenly and intensely. How could he have done this to me? How could he have left me? I broke the kiss abruptly, surprising him. He looked at me quizzically. "John?"
"You complete bastard," I spat out, sitting back up and pushing him off me with both hands as I went. The shock and regret on his face as he fell back nearly undid me, but my hurt was too great. "What the hell have you been playing at the last seven months? You died. You went over the Falls. You and Moriarty. I went to your funeral. Do you know what I've gone through?" I am not a man given to hysteria. I kept my voice low, but it wavered nonetheless. "Do you know what my life has been, Sherlock? Do you?"
He sighed heavily. I could see I had utterly confused him. He was unsure now whether to touch me or not, though he clearly wanted to.
"John, believe me, had I seen any other way…" his voice trailed off. He passed a hand over his eyes, and the exhaustion was evident. Despite my absolute frustration with him, I reached out and took his other hand. The slightest of smiles passed over his lips, but his expression was otherwise rueful and sad.
"I did go over the Falls," he began, "As did Moriarty. And to be honest, I thought I was done. But I landed on a ledge some 15 feet down. Moriarty was not so fortunate." Sherlock's lips pressed together momentarily in an expression of grim satisfaction, and then he went on. "I gave my ankle a good twist, but I was more or less unhurt. But I couldn't stay there, obviously. Moriarty wasn't a threat any longer, but you and I both know that he never acted alone. There were others I had to concern myself with. Not many, and not quite as clever, but just as brutal and just as persistent. And they would not be pleased to hear of his death. Or, more to the point, of my role in his death. It occurred to me that I had a chance to protect us both. If Moriarty's colleagues believed I was dead, it could only help me. They would relax. Make mistakes." He paused. "And they would have no reason to come after you."
"Come after me?" I asked, perplexed. "Why would they do that?"
"John," he said, shaking his head, a tinge of exasperation colouring his voice, "Even if Moriarty's lackeys failed to grasp the nature of our relationship, they knew you were - are - important to me. If there was any indication I'd survived the Falls, even if I'd gone into hiding, they would have come after you to get to me. Do I really need to remind you of the night you spent wrapped in explosives beside a swimming pool?"
It was, of course, obvious. I blamed my recent unconsciousness on my slowness in seeing it.
"How did you survive?" I asked, genuine curiosity overtaking the hurt.
"I climbed," he replied dismissively. "No other option, really. And then I ran. Or rather limped. That was a bother. Slowed me down considerably. With the money I had on me, I got myself to Prague. I couldn't risk using cards."
"Dead men don't use credit cards," I agreed.
"Just so," he responded, absently rubbing his thumb over the ball of my hand, an affectionate habit that I suddenly realized I had missed tremendously. "I wired Mycroft for money once I was in a safe place."
I nodded. That made sense. Wait…
"Mycroft knew?!" I nearly shouted, the anger racing through me again. Of course he knew, that smug bastard. How else would Sherlock have been able to survive? And here I'd thought his lack of obvious signs of grief over his brother's death was merely stoicism. The strained nature of their relationship served to bolster the illusion. Though when I thought back over the past months, I remembered times when I had caught Mycroft looking at me with the strangest expression. Knowing now what had happened, that he was being forced to keep the truth from me, I supposed it was something akin to regret. The realization that Mycroft might genuinely have regretted lying to me did not make me feel better.
I punched Sherlock in the chest with my free hand. Not as hard as I could, but hard enough. He looked at me pleadingly, "John…please, I didn't have a choice. I had to go to Mycroft. I needed money. I needed to know what was going on here. And I needed to know you were safe."
"You could have come to me," I said sharply. "You could have trusted me. Then you wouldn't have needed to go to Mycroft to know I was safe."
"I do trust you, John." He leaned forward, physically emphasizing his point. "But you are not a good liar. Mycroft…"
"Is a very good liar," I finished for him.
He chuckled and I glared. Though I could see where he was going, and I couldn't argue - I was a fairly bad liar - I hadn't finished being seriously angry with him.
His expression of contriteness and concern was back full force, and I forgave him -damn him - the moment of levity at his brother's expense.
"Yes, Mycroft is an exceptionally good liar. And that is what I needed. I needed for you to believe that I was dead. I didn't see how this could work otherwise. It wasn't a decision I made easily. I can't tell you how many times I started to text you. To write to you. Even call you. To explain why I'd disappeared. I didn't do this because I don't care about you, John. I did it because I do care. And I've missed you. More than you know."
I can't say I forgave him completely, but the sincerity in his voice was undeniable. I believed that he was convinced of his correctness, convinced that there truly had been no other way.
I wrapped my arms around him, straining from my seated position to pull him closer. Even kneeling, he was insultingly tall. I could almost feel the tension leave him as he reciprocated, rearranging himself to make the embrace more comfortable for me.
"I'm sorry, John," he said, his face firmly lodged in the space between my ear and shoulder. I tilted my head to accommodate him. "For today, and everything else, too. The disguise was unavoidable. But I didn't need to be so dramatic about it. It was…" He seemed to struggle to find the right words. A number of fine choices came to my mind, but I kept quiet. "A bit not good," he finished, adding a second later, "I had no idea you'd react so strongly."
"You are an idiot," I barked. "I thought you were dead. Did you think you could just show up and get a casual 'hello'?" My face was in his hair, the familiar smell and texture making it increasingly difficult to maintain the degree of outrage I felt the situation still warranted.
"No, no," he responded, "Of course not. But I didn't think you would…."
"Faint," I finished for him. "Have you had Mycroft keeping me under surveillance?"
"Of course," he responded, clearly unsure of what connection this could possibly have to the present conversation and equally oblivious to the fact that asking your brother to keep track of your partner while you pretend to be dead is not, for the general populace anyway, a foregone conclusion.
"And has he reported back to you on my state of mind? My activities? How I've been since your 'death'?"
"Yes," he replied gravely, tightening his arms around me. I could see he was beginning to understand my meaning.
"And you still didn't think you'd get much of a reaction if you came in here, fooled me into believing you were someone else - and you were unbelievably irritating, by the way - and then just… ta-da! Not dead."
I pulled away enough to be able to see his face, which, I was gratified to see, was genuinely chagrined.
"I'm so sorry, John," he repeated. "I wanted to see you. And I wanted to surprise you. I didn't… well, it was clearly not my best plan."
"I don't think you're going to want to file any of this under 'best practices,' no," I said, then added, "You know we have more to discuss. I need to know where you've been. What the hell you've been doing. Why you're back now. Are we in danger? I assume you have a plan. A *better* plan."
He nodded, accepting the ribbing with nothing more than a slight quirk of one brow, the most convincing proof I'd had thus far of his contrition. "I'll tell you everything. Anything you want to know." He looked at me, hesitancy battling with want on his tired face.
I shifted my arm so that his head slid back just slightly and kissed him. He smiled though the kiss and adjusted his body to gain a better position, moving his hand to the back of my head. The office and everything else on the other side of the surgery door be damned. I felt as if I, too, had returned from the dead and if this insane man in my arms thought I was going to let him out of my sight ever again… the impracticality of such thinking was immediately clear, but I did not care. I thought I had lost him forever and with him, a life worth living. Now he was back, hope and passion and possibility rushing in alongside.
Sherlock took his lips from mine suddenly. I was about to protest when he murmured, "Thank you, John."
"For what?" I asked.
"For missing me."