Fic: "Negotiations" (2/3)
Title: "Negotiations” (2/3)
Authors: impishtubist and canonisrelative
Characters: Sherlock/John, Lestrade
Rating: R
Disclaimer: We own nothing.
Word Count: c. 2,000; c. 11,000 total
Warnings: Asexuality Issues; Sexual Situations; Language; Mentions of suicide
Spoilers: through "Reichenbach"
Summary: Sherlock and John are in the process of becoming something more after the events of “Reichenbach,” but a disagreement threatens all they are to one another.
Notes: Operates in the “Winter’s Child” ‘verse, but is able to stand alone. Chronologically, this would be the beginning of the series. The master list can be found here.
----
Part Two: Escalation
It's nearly one in the morning, early by Sherlock's standards. Or late. Or middling. Depending on how he was looking at time relative to days. He's sitting on Lestrade's couch, head in his hands, the ticking of the clock driving him mad as he tries desperately to bring time back under his control, spiralling closer and closer to the realization that it's John who's been grounding him, these past several months; John who provided a centre of gravity around which he could orbit freely. A sense of time and place and rightness that allowed his mind to soar to ever-greater heights.
A kite on a string.
No. Delete that.
He presses the heels of his hands into his eyes until sparks explode painfully against a backdrop that is frightening in its vastness.
The battery is dying on his phone--left the charger at Baker Street and Lestrade's is not compatible--and the warning beep is jarring as he presses it to his ear, the line already ringing.
John doesn't answer.
The phone rings through to voicemail, and Sherlock hangs on through the automated message and then the soft, John Watson. It's brief, less than two seconds, but the familiar tenor shoots to the base of his spine, grounding him, and then just as quickly it's over.
John could be asleep, he tells himself. Or in another room; perhaps he didn't hear his phone.
But he knows that both of these are lies. John is ignoring him; John doesn't want to speak to him.
What if John never wants to speak to him again?
That thought is horrifying, and leaves him reeling. Something unpleasant squeezes his chest, so hard that his heart stutters and he forgets for a moment to breathe. He presses the palm of his hand against his sternum, willing his bodily functions back under his control, trying desperately to regain some sense of himself.
A hallway light clicks on behind him.
"Sunshine?"
----
John's been lying on the couch with his phone pressed against his chest. He does this when Sherlock's away - keeps the phone close just in case. In case the git gets himself in trouble or Lestrade calls to say Sherlock's been taken to the A&E or just in case the bloody fuck stupid idiot is feeling a bit sentimental and just wants to say hello.
Relief washes over him followed far too quickly by anger. Damn right Sherlock should be the one to come grovelling to him, this time. For fucks sake, why was he the one waiting by the phone, pining after the stupid detective like some bloody teenager. Christ. The phone stopped ringing before he could decide what he wanted to yell at Sherlock first.
And then as soon as it goes silent and dark, regret settles in his stomach and he curls up on his side, cradling the stupid bit of metal and plastic, waiting to see if he'll leave a voicemail.
He doesn't, of course. And after fighting with himself for a full five minutes, John sends,
I thought you preferred to text?
---
Sherlock's head snaps up and he glares at Lestrade. Infuriating how the sudden light makes his head swim and his vision blur. He hisses sharply through his teeth, dropping back down on the couch and hiding his eyes behind his arm.
"What, Lestrade?"
"I can hear you thinking all the way down the hallway," Lestrade tells him and, much to Sherlock's annoyance, moves aside his feet and drops onto the opposite end of the sofa. He's dressed in pyjamas and a worn jumper; no dressing gown. "And brooding. Have you been calling him?"
Sherlock would deny it, but his mobile has been abandoned on his chest and it's all-too-obvious what he's been doing, even to someone as dull as Lestrade.
"He's not answering," Sherlock says finally, biting out the words. Lestrade nods and pats his knee; Sherlock resists the urge to move away.
"He might need some space," Lestrade says.
"Not from me," Sherlock growls, and at that moment his phone comes to life. He snatches it off his chest and sees that he's received a text from John. He wishes Lestrade would leave; he wants to answer this in private. And then he wonders why he thought that at all, because he's not talking aloud to John and it's not as though anyone can actually see the screen - especially not now that his phone gives one last feeble flash and goes dark, the battery exhausted.
"Go away," he growls anyway, irrational and hating himself for it.
Lestrade doesn't move. Instead, he huffs and shakes his head, squeezing Sherlock's knee. "This would be my couch in my flat, if you'll remember. Are you going to answer that?"
"Are you going to stop inquiring into matters that don't concern you?" Sherlock's rage flares up, bright and hot and directed at Lestrade for lack of a better target.
Lestrade returns his stare and says coolly, "When you invade my flat and make my life a living hell for days on end, I think it becomes my business, sunshine."
"Stop calling me that," Sherlock grinds out between clenched teeth, fighting very hard against the urge to hurl the now-useless mobile into the wall, settling for pushing himself up and curling into a ball with knees against his chest, as far away from Lestrade as he can get without leaving the couch. "I'm not your bloody child and I won't be coddled. If my presence is really so irksome I'm sure I could find a dozen places I'd rather spend my time than here with you."
Lestrade says nothing to that. He simply gets up off the sofa and returns to his room, and Sherlock can't explain it but the man's abrupt departure leaves him feeling suddenly cold.
Don't leave me, too; I've already lost John and Jack and my father, who I never had in the first place but it stings all the same -
His moment of self-pity is cut abruptly short, though, when Lestrade returns from his bedroom and tosses something at Sherlock. He catches it deftly in his left hand and looks away, hoping that Lestrade wouldn't have seen his face. Even in the dark, he knows the man can read him as surely as if he were an open book. He hates it, most days. But in the early days, when it was just the two of them after Jack's death - he'd been grateful for that. It saved him from trying to voice the things that he couldn't, and saved Lestrade by giving him someone to care for. It focused his attentions elsewhere, away from his all-consuming grief and crumbling marriage.
"What's this for?" Sherlock asks, realizing that he held Lestrade's mobile in his hand.
"Texting," Lestrade says simply. "Your phone's dead. You need to talk to John. Seems like the best solution, yeah? He'll know right away it isn't me, and you can delete anything you don't want me to see afterwards. I'm not that tech-savvy; wouldn't be able to recover them. Not that I'd want to."
He resumes his place on the sofa, slouching down and folding his hands in his lap and closing his eyes. "And I'm gonna sit right here 'til you're done."
---
John stares at the text on his screen, disoriented; there's only one name on his mind, one person in the small, dark world of misery he's built around himself, and it takes longer than it should to figure out who the hell Lestrade is. At last he texts back,
Added theft to your list of transgressions, have you?
----
Lestrade gave it to me, Sherlock texts back, jabbing at the keys harder than he normally would have. Lestrade cracks an eye open to regard him curiously, then closes it once again. Probably doesn't want to really know what's going on.
I'm supposed to believe that, am I?
Why wouldn't you? -SH
You've lied to me before. Forgotten Baskerville already, have we? Adler’s convenient escape from execution?
Sherlock closes his fist around the mobile.
He wants to scream, We have been over this! He wants a row, and he wants it now. He wants to be standing in the living room at Baker Street, with John in the kitchen or by the fireplace, a good amount of distance between the two of them because they know they'll only hurt each other without that particular precaution. It's happened before - John's ended up with a busted lip or up against the wall, wrists slammed above his head and a furious Sherlock looming over him. Sherlock's had his share of black eyes in return. They've both bellowed themselves hoarse and then some.
Sherlock wants that - all of that - right now. He doesn't want to be sitting on the sofa in the peace and quiet with Lestrade sitting calm next to him and a clock ticking lazily away in the kitchen. It's too still, too content a backdrop for the life that is slowly falling apart around him.
It should end with a bang; not with a whimper.
----
I'm supposed to believe that, am I?
Why wouldn't you? -SH
You've lied to me before. Forgotten Baskerville already, have we? Adler’s convenient escape from execution?
When Sherlock doesn't reply right away, John sits up and swings his feet off the couch, hissing as they connect with the cold floor. The flat was always bloody fuck freezing and Sherlock never lifted a finger to do anything about it. What the hell would Sherlock do without him, anyway? Forget to eat, to wash, to pay the rent or empty the trash. No - no, that's right, he'd be fine, because he'd always have Lestrade there to step in and pick up after him. Jesus bloody Christ. He'd probably let Sherlock just move in with him for good, if John kicked him out of Baker street.
His stomach bottoms out, his heart trying desperately to hide behind that shield of anger and outrage that's kept him going for this long. He pushes himself up off the couch, pacing to the window, all the restlessness, all the anxiety, all the fear and indecision - everything that he was able to keep in check when Sherlock was around was coming out to play tonight. His hands are shaking, his leg aching so badly that he's afraid he might have to fish out his cane in the morning. He's under attack by his own body and he hasn't the faintest idea how to fight back, this time.
First the aluminium cane and that awful tap tap tap that accompanied him everywhere, invading even his dreams. Then the wild-eyed detective with that wretched grin and suddenly John was the accompaniment, following Sherlock everywhere, even into bed. What would be next - what would his next crutch look like? Drugs, like Sherlock? Drink, like Lestrade? Something new altogether? He supposed he could pull of the workaholic thing; there were always lives to be saved.
But what was his life without Sherlock? Christ, what a question. He'd never had anything like this before. He didn't know what he was supposed to feel, or how this was supposed to go. He felt what he could only imagine people who sighed over movies wished they felt, and good God he'd never wanted it to come to this. A normal life, that's all he'd wanted. He was to go to medical school and meet a nice person who'd share his home and his life and quibble with him over what show to watch after dinner and what to name the cat. That's what he'd been prepared for. This...this is madness. People aren't meant to feel like this, that's all he figures he knows. He's caught in the gravity well of something he can't explain or even justify to himself, and he's going to burn up, he knows it, if he doesn't break orbit now.
His forehead pressed to the cold glass of the windowpane brings him back down slowly, back to earth, back to his senses. He feels worn down beyond belief and hates the sick twist in his stomach when he realizes that his body is wishing for Sherlock to be here to curl up with. He always sleeps better when Sherlock can be convinced or coerced into joining him in bed.
But no, Sherlock is not here. Sherlock is off somewhere - no; not somewhere. He's with Lestrade. He's not alone. And on that thought he's biting the inside of his cheek until he tastes blood, hands shaking as he types,
So what's happened to your mobile, then? Put it through Lestrade's wall so he lent you his? Not surprising, you could get that man to overlook a murder for you with the right word or two.
----
Sherlock's hands start shaking the moment John's text comes through. Anger - true fury - coils in his stomach, and for a moment he can see nothing but blazing white. He shuts his eyes, trying to regulate his breathing and heartbeat - it would do no good to start breaking things at Lestrade's flat, though he was desperate to hurl that awful lamp sitting on the table next to the sofa at a wall or out the window - and then taps out a furious reply.
You leave him out of this.
The response is immediate. Why? Something you're not telling me - again?
So that's it. On top of everything else, John thought he wanted something more from Lestrade than what they already had. The idea was laughable, and Sherlock might have done so if the situation weren't so bloody idiotic. How could he possibly think Sherlock would want anything - or anyone - other than John? Hadn't he showed John that repeatedly? Hadn't he been clear in his intentions, and his wants? Where had he gone wrong - and how could he possibly make it more obvious?
And why did John have to bring Lestrade into it? Because while there were many things Sherlock will tolerate on a day-to-day basis from other people - needing to eat, for example, at regular intervals during the day, or needing to sleep at night - there were a few he will not. Insulting Lestrade is one of them.
Only he is allowed to do that.
Sherlock can’t think of anything to say to that, and it's obvious that John is past the point of reasoning right now. He carefully erases the messages they'd sent, closes the mobile and sets it on Lestrade’s thigh.
The older man cracks open his eyes. “Finished?”
“Yes,” Sherlock gives a jerky nod, and remembers to add, “Thank you.”
He expects Lestrade to leave. Instead, the older man draws a breath and asks, “D’you feel up to working on a case for me? Nothing major, just a cold one I’ve been knocking about for a few weeks now. Could use a fresh pair of eyes.”
A case. Yes, that is what he needs right now. He needs the clarity and order that the work brings to his mind; he needs the challenge of the puzzle and the thrill of the chase.
And perhaps, if he tried, he could make the work be enough.
“Good. Come around noon; I can get it to you then.”
Lestrade squeezes his shoulder, and wishes him good night.
----
Part Three
Authors: impishtubist and canonisrelative
Characters: Sherlock/John, Lestrade
Rating: R
Disclaimer: We own nothing.
Word Count: c. 2,000; c. 11,000 total
Warnings: Asexuality Issues; Sexual Situations; Language; Mentions of suicide
Spoilers: through "Reichenbach"
Summary: Sherlock and John are in the process of becoming something more after the events of “Reichenbach,” but a disagreement threatens all they are to one another.
Notes: Operates in the “Winter’s Child” ‘verse, but is able to stand alone. Chronologically, this would be the beginning of the series. The master list can be found here.
----
Part Two: Escalation
It's nearly one in the morning, early by Sherlock's standards. Or late. Or middling. Depending on how he was looking at time relative to days. He's sitting on Lestrade's couch, head in his hands, the ticking of the clock driving him mad as he tries desperately to bring time back under his control, spiralling closer and closer to the realization that it's John who's been grounding him, these past several months; John who provided a centre of gravity around which he could orbit freely. A sense of time and place and rightness that allowed his mind to soar to ever-greater heights.
A kite on a string.
No. Delete that.
He presses the heels of his hands into his eyes until sparks explode painfully against a backdrop that is frightening in its vastness.
The battery is dying on his phone--left the charger at Baker Street and Lestrade's is not compatible--and the warning beep is jarring as he presses it to his ear, the line already ringing.
John doesn't answer.
The phone rings through to voicemail, and Sherlock hangs on through the automated message and then the soft, John Watson. It's brief, less than two seconds, but the familiar tenor shoots to the base of his spine, grounding him, and then just as quickly it's over.
John could be asleep, he tells himself. Or in another room; perhaps he didn't hear his phone.
But he knows that both of these are lies. John is ignoring him; John doesn't want to speak to him.
What if John never wants to speak to him again?
That thought is horrifying, and leaves him reeling. Something unpleasant squeezes his chest, so hard that his heart stutters and he forgets for a moment to breathe. He presses the palm of his hand against his sternum, willing his bodily functions back under his control, trying desperately to regain some sense of himself.
A hallway light clicks on behind him.
"Sunshine?"
----
John's been lying on the couch with his phone pressed against his chest. He does this when Sherlock's away - keeps the phone close just in case. In case the git gets himself in trouble or Lestrade calls to say Sherlock's been taken to the A&E or just in case the bloody fuck stupid idiot is feeling a bit sentimental and just wants to say hello.
Relief washes over him followed far too quickly by anger. Damn right Sherlock should be the one to come grovelling to him, this time. For fucks sake, why was he the one waiting by the phone, pining after the stupid detective like some bloody teenager. Christ. The phone stopped ringing before he could decide what he wanted to yell at Sherlock first.
And then as soon as it goes silent and dark, regret settles in his stomach and he curls up on his side, cradling the stupid bit of metal and plastic, waiting to see if he'll leave a voicemail.
He doesn't, of course. And after fighting with himself for a full five minutes, John sends,
I thought you preferred to text?
---
Sherlock's head snaps up and he glares at Lestrade. Infuriating how the sudden light makes his head swim and his vision blur. He hisses sharply through his teeth, dropping back down on the couch and hiding his eyes behind his arm.
"What, Lestrade?"
"I can hear you thinking all the way down the hallway," Lestrade tells him and, much to Sherlock's annoyance, moves aside his feet and drops onto the opposite end of the sofa. He's dressed in pyjamas and a worn jumper; no dressing gown. "And brooding. Have you been calling him?"
Sherlock would deny it, but his mobile has been abandoned on his chest and it's all-too-obvious what he's been doing, even to someone as dull as Lestrade.
"He's not answering," Sherlock says finally, biting out the words. Lestrade nods and pats his knee; Sherlock resists the urge to move away.
"He might need some space," Lestrade says.
"Not from me," Sherlock growls, and at that moment his phone comes to life. He snatches it off his chest and sees that he's received a text from John. He wishes Lestrade would leave; he wants to answer this in private. And then he wonders why he thought that at all, because he's not talking aloud to John and it's not as though anyone can actually see the screen - especially not now that his phone gives one last feeble flash and goes dark, the battery exhausted.
"Go away," he growls anyway, irrational and hating himself for it.
Lestrade doesn't move. Instead, he huffs and shakes his head, squeezing Sherlock's knee. "This would be my couch in my flat, if you'll remember. Are you going to answer that?"
"Are you going to stop inquiring into matters that don't concern you?" Sherlock's rage flares up, bright and hot and directed at Lestrade for lack of a better target.
Lestrade returns his stare and says coolly, "When you invade my flat and make my life a living hell for days on end, I think it becomes my business, sunshine."
"Stop calling me that," Sherlock grinds out between clenched teeth, fighting very hard against the urge to hurl the now-useless mobile into the wall, settling for pushing himself up and curling into a ball with knees against his chest, as far away from Lestrade as he can get without leaving the couch. "I'm not your bloody child and I won't be coddled. If my presence is really so irksome I'm sure I could find a dozen places I'd rather spend my time than here with you."
Lestrade says nothing to that. He simply gets up off the sofa and returns to his room, and Sherlock can't explain it but the man's abrupt departure leaves him feeling suddenly cold.
Don't leave me, too; I've already lost John and Jack and my father, who I never had in the first place but it stings all the same -
His moment of self-pity is cut abruptly short, though, when Lestrade returns from his bedroom and tosses something at Sherlock. He catches it deftly in his left hand and looks away, hoping that Lestrade wouldn't have seen his face. Even in the dark, he knows the man can read him as surely as if he were an open book. He hates it, most days. But in the early days, when it was just the two of them after Jack's death - he'd been grateful for that. It saved him from trying to voice the things that he couldn't, and saved Lestrade by giving him someone to care for. It focused his attentions elsewhere, away from his all-consuming grief and crumbling marriage.
"What's this for?" Sherlock asks, realizing that he held Lestrade's mobile in his hand.
"Texting," Lestrade says simply. "Your phone's dead. You need to talk to John. Seems like the best solution, yeah? He'll know right away it isn't me, and you can delete anything you don't want me to see afterwards. I'm not that tech-savvy; wouldn't be able to recover them. Not that I'd want to."
He resumes his place on the sofa, slouching down and folding his hands in his lap and closing his eyes. "And I'm gonna sit right here 'til you're done."
---
John stares at the text on his screen, disoriented; there's only one name on his mind, one person in the small, dark world of misery he's built around himself, and it takes longer than it should to figure out who the hell Lestrade is. At last he texts back,
Added theft to your list of transgressions, have you?
----
Lestrade gave it to me, Sherlock texts back, jabbing at the keys harder than he normally would have. Lestrade cracks an eye open to regard him curiously, then closes it once again. Probably doesn't want to really know what's going on.
I'm supposed to believe that, am I?
Why wouldn't you? -SH
You've lied to me before. Forgotten Baskerville already, have we? Adler’s convenient escape from execution?
Sherlock closes his fist around the mobile.
He wants to scream, We have been over this! He wants a row, and he wants it now. He wants to be standing in the living room at Baker Street, with John in the kitchen or by the fireplace, a good amount of distance between the two of them because they know they'll only hurt each other without that particular precaution. It's happened before - John's ended up with a busted lip or up against the wall, wrists slammed above his head and a furious Sherlock looming over him. Sherlock's had his share of black eyes in return. They've both bellowed themselves hoarse and then some.
Sherlock wants that - all of that - right now. He doesn't want to be sitting on the sofa in the peace and quiet with Lestrade sitting calm next to him and a clock ticking lazily away in the kitchen. It's too still, too content a backdrop for the life that is slowly falling apart around him.
It should end with a bang; not with a whimper.
----
I'm supposed to believe that, am I?
Why wouldn't you? -SH
You've lied to me before. Forgotten Baskerville already, have we? Adler’s convenient escape from execution?
When Sherlock doesn't reply right away, John sits up and swings his feet off the couch, hissing as they connect with the cold floor. The flat was always bloody fuck freezing and Sherlock never lifted a finger to do anything about it. What the hell would Sherlock do without him, anyway? Forget to eat, to wash, to pay the rent or empty the trash. No - no, that's right, he'd be fine, because he'd always have Lestrade there to step in and pick up after him. Jesus bloody Christ. He'd probably let Sherlock just move in with him for good, if John kicked him out of Baker street.
His stomach bottoms out, his heart trying desperately to hide behind that shield of anger and outrage that's kept him going for this long. He pushes himself up off the couch, pacing to the window, all the restlessness, all the anxiety, all the fear and indecision - everything that he was able to keep in check when Sherlock was around was coming out to play tonight. His hands are shaking, his leg aching so badly that he's afraid he might have to fish out his cane in the morning. He's under attack by his own body and he hasn't the faintest idea how to fight back, this time.
First the aluminium cane and that awful tap tap tap that accompanied him everywhere, invading even his dreams. Then the wild-eyed detective with that wretched grin and suddenly John was the accompaniment, following Sherlock everywhere, even into bed. What would be next - what would his next crutch look like? Drugs, like Sherlock? Drink, like Lestrade? Something new altogether? He supposed he could pull of the workaholic thing; there were always lives to be saved.
But what was his life without Sherlock? Christ, what a question. He'd never had anything like this before. He didn't know what he was supposed to feel, or how this was supposed to go. He felt what he could only imagine people who sighed over movies wished they felt, and good God he'd never wanted it to come to this. A normal life, that's all he'd wanted. He was to go to medical school and meet a nice person who'd share his home and his life and quibble with him over what show to watch after dinner and what to name the cat. That's what he'd been prepared for. This...this is madness. People aren't meant to feel like this, that's all he figures he knows. He's caught in the gravity well of something he can't explain or even justify to himself, and he's going to burn up, he knows it, if he doesn't break orbit now.
His forehead pressed to the cold glass of the windowpane brings him back down slowly, back to earth, back to his senses. He feels worn down beyond belief and hates the sick twist in his stomach when he realizes that his body is wishing for Sherlock to be here to curl up with. He always sleeps better when Sherlock can be convinced or coerced into joining him in bed.
But no, Sherlock is not here. Sherlock is off somewhere - no; not somewhere. He's with Lestrade. He's not alone. And on that thought he's biting the inside of his cheek until he tastes blood, hands shaking as he types,
So what's happened to your mobile, then? Put it through Lestrade's wall so he lent you his? Not surprising, you could get that man to overlook a murder for you with the right word or two.
----
Sherlock's hands start shaking the moment John's text comes through. Anger - true fury - coils in his stomach, and for a moment he can see nothing but blazing white. He shuts his eyes, trying to regulate his breathing and heartbeat - it would do no good to start breaking things at Lestrade's flat, though he was desperate to hurl that awful lamp sitting on the table next to the sofa at a wall or out the window - and then taps out a furious reply.
You leave him out of this.
The response is immediate. Why? Something you're not telling me - again?
So that's it. On top of everything else, John thought he wanted something more from Lestrade than what they already had. The idea was laughable, and Sherlock might have done so if the situation weren't so bloody idiotic. How could he possibly think Sherlock would want anything - or anyone - other than John? Hadn't he showed John that repeatedly? Hadn't he been clear in his intentions, and his wants? Where had he gone wrong - and how could he possibly make it more obvious?
And why did John have to bring Lestrade into it? Because while there were many things Sherlock will tolerate on a day-to-day basis from other people - needing to eat, for example, at regular intervals during the day, or needing to sleep at night - there were a few he will not. Insulting Lestrade is one of them.
Only he is allowed to do that.
Sherlock can’t think of anything to say to that, and it's obvious that John is past the point of reasoning right now. He carefully erases the messages they'd sent, closes the mobile and sets it on Lestrade’s thigh.
The older man cracks open his eyes. “Finished?”
“Yes,” Sherlock gives a jerky nod, and remembers to add, “Thank you.”
He expects Lestrade to leave. Instead, the older man draws a breath and asks, “D’you feel up to working on a case for me? Nothing major, just a cold one I’ve been knocking about for a few weeks now. Could use a fresh pair of eyes.”
A case. Yes, that is what he needs right now. He needs the clarity and order that the work brings to his mind; he needs the challenge of the puzzle and the thrill of the chase.
And perhaps, if he tried, he could make the work be enough.
“Good. Come around noon; I can get it to you then.”
Lestrade squeezes his shoulder, and wishes him good night.
----
Part Three