Slings and Arrows
Originally posted to Watson's Woes
Title: Slings and Arrows
Author: Pompey
Word count: 1100
Warnings: angst, grief, loads upon loads of death
Rating: PG
Summary: What on earth could he say to a man who had lost all his children, a son-in-law, untold cousins, friends, and finally his wife in a span of only four years? Originally meant as an entry to the 005 challenge, where Mary doesn't die during the Hiatus . . . so please note this is highly AU.
A/N: Thanks to aragonite for the use of the name "Arthur." However, William and Trevor and Ellie and Eddie are my OC's.
“I hope to God I never see the color black again for the rest of my life,” Watson muttered bitterly.
Holmes remained silent. What on earth could he say to a man who had lost all his children, a son-in-law, untold cousins, friends, and finally his wife in a span of only four years?
Of course, Watson was hardly alone in his bereavement. Those whom the war had spared the influenza had not. The entire world, it seemed, was grieving. What did it care for one more death amongst millions? It was but one more picture to go on the top shelf of the doctor’s bookcase, one more to join all the others in what Holmes had come to think of as even more morbid than his old collection of criminal portraits.
There on the shelf already was Arthur and William and Trevor, all sturdy, kind-hearted lads like their father. Perhaps too much like their father. Arthur joined up not quite a week after his twentieth birthday, just as the call went out. It was the only thing a young man like he could have done, he who was a natural-born leader and athlete. Watson and Mary had done their best to see their eldest son off cheerfully but between old memories and new rumors, they had not quite pulled it off.
Quiet, studious William joined up the following spring, waiting until the day after his eighteenth birthday. Holmes himself offered his second godson a chance to work in intelligence; a quick mind with a strong literary bend like his was well suited for codes. But William had gently but firmly refused. Men were needed on the front, said he, and so it was to the front that he would go.
Two days after he left the Watsons received word that Arthur had been killed in combat in a little hamlet called St. Julian. A little over a year later William too was dead, one of the first fallen in the Battle of the Somme.
Twelve months passed in relative ease. And then it was Trevor’s turn and that was the hardest of all for everyone. To celebrate his eighteenth birthday they had a small celebratory dinner with a few close friends as guests, despite the rationing that had gone into effect. Trevor spent the day in London and returned that fine May evening already wearing his khaki.
Mary gasped and hid her face in her hands, repeating in a whisper Jacob’s tortured, “Joseph is not and Simeon is not and ye will take Benjamin away” that so many parents before her had invoked. Watson lost his temper entirely. And Trevor - steady, easy-going Trevor - had shouted things no one would have believed would even cross his sweet-tempered mind. Things were said that really ought not to be said amongst people who might never see each other again. Tacitly the few guests slunk to their respective homes.
In the end Trevor went and at the train station embraced his parents one last time. “Please come back,” Mary whispered brokenly, clinging to her youngest and last son. “Please, please come back.” It was a request Trevor was able to fulfill, returning from the Piave River minus a leg. By the time he was at the Chanel, however, the shock and hardship was proving too much for his taxed system. He arrived at Dover thoroughly “on his shield.” Of the three brothers, only Trevor was buried in familiar soil.
There too on the shelf was a picture of Elizabeth Watson and young Dr. Edward Howell on their wedding day. Ellie and Eddie, the family had taken to calling the pair. Edward had come in as Watson’s junior partner and ended up as a son-in-law. A shy, bespeckled stork of a man, Edward’s conscription had been put off for medical reasons until it was plain His Majesty’s army was too desperate to be picky. Off he went around the same time as Trevor, leaving his pregnant wife behind.
But the same battle that had claimed Trevor’s leg nearly claimed Edward’s life. A stray bullet tore through his brain. It did not kill him but it ripped away every useful part of his mind, leaving him worse off than a child. Elizabeth, sick with grief and miserable from her condition, went to tend him only to be struck down with the Spanish ‘flu.
When the news reached the Watsons’s household Mary could take no more. Three children dead, she would not lose her fourth and first-born. And yet she did, and a stillborn grandchild besides. Edward, at last, succumbed. A scant two weeks later, Mary herself showed symptoms of that dreaded illness.
Her funeral was but a few hours in the past.
Glancing about him, Holmes could sympathize with Watson’s sudden aversion to black. It seemed this house had no sooner taken down the crepe for one poor soul than it must go back up for another. Indeed, at times it was possible to forget just who was being mourned and whose time for mourning was past.
Holmes had always wondered at society’s readiness to venerate the dead at the expense of the living: burying widows alive in their weeds; razing hovels and turning out their occupants but requiring permission to relocate cemeteries; allowing those left behind to snuff out their own life-sparks because it showed devotion to those passed on. So many gone and yet they two endured. He and Watson; they were still here. Did that mean nothing?
“You are not alone,” he heard himself say suddenly.
Watson looked at him in some surprise. “You are sick to death of black also?”
It took Holmes a moment to realize Watson has misconstrued his words entirely. “I am sickened by what it represents and tired of it seeing everywhere. But what I meant was, you are not alone.”
Watson merely looked at him, brow heavily furrowed. Holmes watched carefully. He had nearly accepted it but just to be sure -
“You are not alone, Watson. And neither, I trust, am I.”
Ah, just there. A flicker of light before the fresh grief washed over his features again. Watson’s head was bowed but he nodded faintly. “No, not alone,” Holmes thought he heard him whisper.
It was a start. Holmes had no illusions as to the time it would take Watson to recover these repeated shocks to the heart, if he ever would. But it was a start.
Tomorrow he would broach the topic of finally taking down that blasted crepe at last.
Title: Slings and Arrows
Author: Pompey
Word count: 1100
Warnings: angst, grief, loads upon loads of death
Rating: PG
Summary: What on earth could he say to a man who had lost all his children, a son-in-law, untold cousins, friends, and finally his wife in a span of only four years? Originally meant as an entry to the 005 challenge, where Mary doesn't die during the Hiatus . . . so please note this is highly AU.
A/N: Thanks to aragonite for the use of the name "Arthur." However, William and Trevor and Ellie and Eddie are my OC's.
“I hope to God I never see the color black again for the rest of my life,” Watson muttered bitterly.
Holmes remained silent. What on earth could he say to a man who had lost all his children, a son-in-law, untold cousins, friends, and finally his wife in a span of only four years?
Of course, Watson was hardly alone in his bereavement. Those whom the war had spared the influenza had not. The entire world, it seemed, was grieving. What did it care for one more death amongst millions? It was but one more picture to go on the top shelf of the doctor’s bookcase, one more to join all the others in what Holmes had come to think of as even more morbid than his old collection of criminal portraits.
There on the shelf already was Arthur and William and Trevor, all sturdy, kind-hearted lads like their father. Perhaps too much like their father. Arthur joined up not quite a week after his twentieth birthday, just as the call went out. It was the only thing a young man like he could have done, he who was a natural-born leader and athlete. Watson and Mary had done their best to see their eldest son off cheerfully but between old memories and new rumors, they had not quite pulled it off.
Quiet, studious William joined up the following spring, waiting until the day after his eighteenth birthday. Holmes himself offered his second godson a chance to work in intelligence; a quick mind with a strong literary bend like his was well suited for codes. But William had gently but firmly refused. Men were needed on the front, said he, and so it was to the front that he would go.
Two days after he left the Watsons received word that Arthur had been killed in combat in a little hamlet called St. Julian. A little over a year later William too was dead, one of the first fallen in the Battle of the Somme.
Twelve months passed in relative ease. And then it was Trevor’s turn and that was the hardest of all for everyone. To celebrate his eighteenth birthday they had a small celebratory dinner with a few close friends as guests, despite the rationing that had gone into effect. Trevor spent the day in London and returned that fine May evening already wearing his khaki.
Mary gasped and hid her face in her hands, repeating in a whisper Jacob’s tortured, “Joseph is not and Simeon is not and ye will take Benjamin away” that so many parents before her had invoked. Watson lost his temper entirely. And Trevor - steady, easy-going Trevor - had shouted things no one would have believed would even cross his sweet-tempered mind. Things were said that really ought not to be said amongst people who might never see each other again. Tacitly the few guests slunk to their respective homes.
In the end Trevor went and at the train station embraced his parents one last time. “Please come back,” Mary whispered brokenly, clinging to her youngest and last son. “Please, please come back.” It was a request Trevor was able to fulfill, returning from the Piave River minus a leg. By the time he was at the Chanel, however, the shock and hardship was proving too much for his taxed system. He arrived at Dover thoroughly “on his shield.” Of the three brothers, only Trevor was buried in familiar soil.
There too on the shelf was a picture of Elizabeth Watson and young Dr. Edward Howell on their wedding day. Ellie and Eddie, the family had taken to calling the pair. Edward had come in as Watson’s junior partner and ended up as a son-in-law. A shy, bespeckled stork of a man, Edward’s conscription had been put off for medical reasons until it was plain His Majesty’s army was too desperate to be picky. Off he went around the same time as Trevor, leaving his pregnant wife behind.
But the same battle that had claimed Trevor’s leg nearly claimed Edward’s life. A stray bullet tore through his brain. It did not kill him but it ripped away every useful part of his mind, leaving him worse off than a child. Elizabeth, sick with grief and miserable from her condition, went to tend him only to be struck down with the Spanish ‘flu.
When the news reached the Watsons’s household Mary could take no more. Three children dead, she would not lose her fourth and first-born. And yet she did, and a stillborn grandchild besides. Edward, at last, succumbed. A scant two weeks later, Mary herself showed symptoms of that dreaded illness.
Her funeral was but a few hours in the past.
Glancing about him, Holmes could sympathize with Watson’s sudden aversion to black. It seemed this house had no sooner taken down the crepe for one poor soul than it must go back up for another. Indeed, at times it was possible to forget just who was being mourned and whose time for mourning was past.
Holmes had always wondered at society’s readiness to venerate the dead at the expense of the living: burying widows alive in their weeds; razing hovels and turning out their occupants but requiring permission to relocate cemeteries; allowing those left behind to snuff out their own life-sparks because it showed devotion to those passed on. So many gone and yet they two endured. He and Watson; they were still here. Did that mean nothing?
“You are not alone,” he heard himself say suddenly.
Watson looked at him in some surprise. “You are sick to death of black also?”
It took Holmes a moment to realize Watson has misconstrued his words entirely. “I am sickened by what it represents and tired of it seeing everywhere. But what I meant was, you are not alone.”
Watson merely looked at him, brow heavily furrowed. Holmes watched carefully. He had nearly accepted it but just to be sure -
“You are not alone, Watson. And neither, I trust, am I.”
Ah, just there. A flicker of light before the fresh grief washed over his features again. Watson’s head was bowed but he nodded faintly. “No, not alone,” Holmes thought he heard him whisper.
It was a start. Holmes had no illusions as to the time it would take Watson to recover these repeated shocks to the heart, if he ever would. But it was a start.
Tomorrow he would broach the topic of finally taking down that blasted crepe at last.