Sherlock fic: A day for happiness (Lestrade/John + Sherlock, PG)
Fandom & Pairing: Sherlock BBC season 2, Lestrade/John + Sherlock
Rating: PG
Warnings: none
Genre: drama
Word Count: Around 3150
Summary: Sherlock's return proves more complicated than any of them envisaged.
"Greg! Can you get over to Baker Street? There's something you've got to see."
Greg smiled at the memory as he emerged from the glare of Baker Street tube station into the afternoon sunlight of a beautiful spring day. He shouldn't have left work for several hours yet but the joy in John's voice had been too good to ignore. John had called him. John had wanted him to come over. John's voice had been alight with happiness.
He made a mental grimace at his own fluttering pleasure. He was far too old to feel like this about someone else. Men fast closing in on fifty, let alone hardened, cynical coppers with tarnished careers and battered hearts, were not supposed to be shivering inside with all the delight of a first crush. But he couldn't help the spring in his step as he strode along the pavement towards 221b.
John was happy and John had called him.
Their thing for which Greg could still not quite find a name had not had its origins in happiness. In Greg's mind there were three stages in what he thought of as the era PS, post-Sherlock. The first stage had been six months of grinding misery as Greg had tried to salvage his own career and survive the dislike and disdain manifested by so many of his colleagues, while watching John flounder through a swamp of misery, living his life as if barely conscious.
He had taken John out for a drink every Thursday, in the vain hope that if he didn't intrude on the weekends, John might eventually resume some kind of social life. For weeks they'd sat in gloomy silence, staring into their respective beverages, every topic they had in common a minefield of pain and unresolved anger. Still, Greg had asked every Thursday, just to be sure John had survived another week, and John had never said no.
Then suddenly John had seemed to pull himself together, so abruptly that Greg suspected there was a post-it in John's wallet, telling himself to get a life. John had started to enquire about Greg's job. Fortunately by then the internal investigation had found no irregularities in any of the investigations that had involved Sherlock, and the threat of dismissal or forced resignation had receded somewhat, although Greg was damn sure he'd never be promoted again. They'd manage to laugh awkwardly about some of the more bizarre aspects of the investigation.
John had started to talk about Sherlock again too. Asking Greg for stories of the detective from before John met him, telling stories of his time coming to terms with his unique flatmate. Their shared affection for Sherlock had made that laughter a little easier, even as it brought back the pang of loss every time.
And John had started to date again, to date the sweetest, blandest, most ordinary girls he could find. Sherlock would have despised every one of them. Even Greg had been taken aback by how aggressively banal they all were, as if John was determined that nothing extraordinary would ever happen to him again. Greg had soon given up worrying about some spectacularly ill-advised rebound marriage, as John had proved as adept at sabotaging his own romances as Sherlock had ever been. Every month there had been a a new one, with John determinedly, painfully optimistic that this was the one. And every time before the month was out it was over.
What Greg thought of as phase three had begun so late on a Saturday night that it was early Sunday morning. A drunken John had hammered on his door, having apparently just broken up with the most serious of all his attempts, a pretty mouse of girl called Mary.
But his troubles with Mary had lasted barely five minutes into the conversation. After that it was Sherlock, all Sherlock. John's anger, his bitterness, his frustration, his sense of utter betrayal, his bottomless grief. The good little soldier had finally cracked and he'd ended up flailing wildly at Greg, too drunk and too upset to even hit straight. Greg had wrestled him into a rough embrace, trying to contain the wild movements before John hurt himself. He'd got a mouth full of tongue for his troubles.
He'd meant to stop it, he really had. But he hadn't had sex since the last round with his wife, a toxic mix of anger and nostalgia after they emerged from the lawyer's office having signed the divorce agreement. And he'd had his own long months of grief and frustration and depression weighing down on him. He'd torn open both their trouser-fronts, grabbed the back of John' neck with one hand and both their cocks with the other and tugged ruthlessly until they'd both spilt hot come over Greg's hand. John had stumbled out soon after and Greg had assumed he'd not be seeing him again any time soon.
He hadn't texted to confirm their Thursday night drink as he usually did. But John had. They'd drunk. They'd talked about Sherlock. John hadn't brought up any new girlfriends. They'd not discussed it. Ten days later Greg had stood with the bodies of two dead children, signs of some kind of abusive ritual, a few scraps of contradictory evidence and a fierce longing for Sherlock and his insight. He'd texted John. The evening had ended in a half-dressed tangle on Greg's sofa, empty pizza boxes pushed to one side, Die Hard II rumbling in the background.
They still didn't talk about it. It needed a crisis each time, John having a patient die, Greg being threatened with another internal investigation, John having a run-in with Mycroft, Greg blamed in the tabloids for the stalled investigation of the child murders. Each time they fucked in and round and through the ghost of Sherlock, through the love and grief and anger that bound them together.
But it eased slowly, as time passed inexorably. The crises became smaller. John's idiot patients convinced that the common cold was a precursor to a brain tumour. Greg's idiot superiors who couldn't even sign off on a budget for coffee at the Yard. More and more often there was wry humour under the excuse, a tacit acknowledgement that it had become a game, even if neither of them could quite let go of the ritual of the excuse. Greg increasingly felt that they saw each other, John and Greg, with Sherlock becoming a bitter-sweet shared memory, rather than seeing Sherlock's side-kick and Sherlock's pet detective.
And now John had called him. John, bubbling with excitement, with something he wanted to share with Greg. No excuse, no crisis. Greg bounded up the steps, two stairs at a time, heart light, hoping that this might be the start of stage four, a chance to move forward with Sherlock always part of their shared past but with a future that would belong to them. Hoping this might be a day for happiness.
"So, what's up with you, then?" said Greg as he pushed through the door, eyes searching out John. It took him a moment to realise that the other man had company. Another moment to process who that company was.
"Greg! Look who's come home!"
Greg stared at the lanky form of Sherlock and thought with distant amazement that he'd not realised that a heart could mend and break at the same time. He glanced over at John, took in the sparkling blue eyes, the broad smile, the lines of weariness that he'd traced so often with his fingers now eliminated by radiant happiness.
Sherlock was back. All was well. John was as enthralled as ever. And it was his cue to step back into the shadows like the obedient minor supporting actor he'd always been in the drama that was the life of Sherlock. He felt sick.
"Nothing to say, Inspector?" demanded Sherlock. "At a loss for words as usual. I see some things haven't changed in my absence. God know how your department survived without me. Badly, I suspect. Well, don't you want to know how I did it?"
Greg glanced back at John, burning with happiness, apparently eager to hear Sherlock's tale of wonder, all grief and anger miraculously forgotten. He thought back to one of those whispered conversations, late at night, John's face buried against Greg's neck. John confessing how often he'd thought of suicide during those first months. How he'd not wanted to use his gun in case his possession of an unregistered firearm somehow got Greg into even more trouble. How he'd made a list of all the other ways he could do it, working out which one would be most fool-proof while being the least trouble to his friends.
Out of all that confession, it was that last thought that had hurt Greg most. That good little soldier John had not wanted his death to be any trouble. Not like Sherlock and his rooftop dramas, not like Sherlock and his escalating game of confrontation with his nemesis, drawing all that loved him into the danger zone. And after all that, none of it had been true. They'd all continued to be the silly little pawns they'd always been, being moved hither and yon to suit Sherlock's delusions of deity, their emotions a curious weakness to be batted away with all the concern offered to a house fly.
Greg felt his hands drawing up into tight fists. If he'd been twenty years younger, he'd have knocked Sherlock down there and then. But he'd learnt control with age, just as he'd learnt the bitter truth of his own lack of importance in the scheme of things.
He turned back to Sherlock, who was quivering like a greyhound in his eagerness to share his own cleverness.
"Fuck you."
Greg turned, walked out of the door, down the stairs and back into the spring sunlight. He hesitated for a moment, blinking hard to contain the prickling of his eyes. He couldn't bear to go back to his flat, with its memories of John laughing on his sofa, John messing about his kitchen, John asleep in his bed. He couldn't face his work again. And if Sherlock came anywhere near his department ever again, he was putting in for an immediate transfer to North Yorkshire. He walked moodily in the direction of Regent's Park, clenched fists buried in the pockets of his coat, trying to talk his battered heart through yet another loss. How many could you take, he wondered, before the damage ran so deep that you couldn't ever love again?
He ended up sitting on a bench, staring moodily at the Boating Lake, a large drake giving him a beady eye, clearly displeased by the lack of food on offer. "Piss off," Greg said to it. "You and me both, mate. No scraps coming our way. Better bloody well get used to it."
Footsteps approached. Greg kept his head down, in no mood for eye contact with anyone. Still something about the deliberate tread clearly targeted at his bench told him this was not a stranger. John. It had to be. Of course sweet, concerned, well-mannered John would have come after him, despite his desire to spend every minute of the rest of his life with Sherlock. At moments like this Greg wished desperately that John was a little more selfish.
Now there would have to be an awkward discussion, John being apologetic, Greg being polite, John trying to let him down gently, Greg trying to hurry the process along. God, it was going to be unbearable. Maybe he should just tell John to fuck off, too, but that would be like kicking a puppy. And Greg couldn't bring himself to hurt John like that. He'd made enough of a fool of himself already, walking out like that, as much of a drama queen as Sherlock had ever been. He'd have to apologise. He'd have to patch things up and then ease himself out of John's life gently. Christ, what a mess.
"I had worked out odds on various possible reactions but I have to say that your response was unexpected."
Sherlock. Definitely unexpected.
One pair of shoes. He was on his own. John must have sent him. Nothing else made sense.
"There was no need to walk out. I do not intend to end your... you know, your thing with John."
Greg's head shot up. "He told you?" He looked hard at Sherlock. He might not have the other man's skills of observation but that didn't mean he was blind. "No, he didn't, did he?" Greg thought quickly. "You've been watching us?" He jumped up onto his feet. "You have, haven't you. You bastard! You've had us under observation!"
He grabbed the lapels of Sherlock's stupid black bat coat. This time he had no intention of restraining his anger. "You've been watching us like some kind of lab rats. Amusing yourself by observing our attempts to cope. How could you? Did you see what your death did to John? Did you see the hurt he carried, week after week, month after month? Did you care, at all? Or was it all just part of your little game?"
"Lestrade, no, it wasn't like that." To Greg's surprise, Sherlock put his hands up over Greg's, where he still clung to the other man's coat. To his knowledge, Sherlock never voluntarily touched other people. "I had no choice. I was protecting you both."
"Protecting him?" Greg shook Sherlock loose and took a step backwards. "Do you know how close he came to killing himself?"
"I didn't expect him to care that much. I didn't realise. But Greg, I had no choice. They were going to kill him. They were going to kill you. The only way I could find to keep you safe was to disappear."
"What changed?" demanded Greg.
"I finally got rid of the last of the Moriarty's spawn, his inner circle of henchmen and associates. Mycroft is mopping up the remnants."
"And you couldn't have trusted me to help you? You couldn't have found a way to give John a hint?"
"I thought it would be safer and faster to work on my own. No one I cared about that they could use against me. No one's stupidity to slow me down. Finally free to weave my web of revenge without distractions."
Greg looked at Sherlock, really looked, and saw the changes he'd missed in his initial shock. Sherlock was thin again, nearly as thin as when Greg had first stumbled over the junkie wraith with the sharp tongue in a squat. But his eyes were clear this time and his gaze steady, open to Greg in a way he'd never seen before. There were lines on that once alabaster-smooth face and he looked considerably more than eighteen months older.
Greg sat down on the bench again, suddenly terribly tired. "You thought. Does that mean that's not quite how it worked out?"
Sherlock sat down next to him. The drake, scared off by their confrontation, returned cautiously, accompanied by some hopeful friends. "I didn't like it," said Sherlock, with an abrupt petulance that made him sound young again. "I didn't have anyone to talk to. I didn't have anyone to help me. It was..., I was...."
"What?"
"Lonely. Miserable. I hated it!" Sherlock sounded aggrieved, as if this turn of events was quite inexplicable to him. "I watched you both, to be sure you were safe. But also... I watched to..." His voice trailed into silence. Greg felt his heart quietly break again.
"I didn't mind it, you and John," Sherlock continued earnestly. "You're a lot better than any of those awful women he chooses. And you won't get in the way of investigations. It's quite convenient, really."
"Sherlock," Greg protested, half annoyed, half amused, just like the old days. "You can't just grant me some bit of John's time. It doesn't work like that." And he didn't want the scraps, he thought. He didn't want to be the consolation prize to be pulled out of the cupboard on the rare occasion that John had been abandoned by Sherlock.
"Why not?" demanded Sherlock, aggrieved. "It's perfectly fair. I'm sharing him with you and you with him. It works."
"You are sharing me with him?" queried Greg. "What's that supposed to mean?"
Sherlock stared at him, as if all his direst suspicions about Greg's lack of mental acuity had finally been confirmed. "Well, you're my Detective Inspector."
Greg buried his head in his hands and started to chuckle. Startled, the ducks fluttered and scattered. Eventually Greg looked up at Sherlock's perplexed face, Sherlock's oh-so-very-alive face, screwed up in annoyance, and let go completely. Let the laughter shake right through his body, let it shake back into place some of the pieces of his heart.
"Maybe we should ask John what he thinks," said Greg at last.
Sherlock brightened and began texting furiously. He showed it to Greg as he pressed send.
In Regents Park.
Come now.
Bring duck food.
John joined them suspiciously quickly, quick enough to make Greg think he'd had them both under surveillance.
"That was a bit dramatic," John said to Greg.
"Sorry," offered Greg with an apologetic shrug. He tried to work out where to start with an explanation but John cut him off.
"It's okay, Sherlock has that affect on people."
Greg and Sherlock were seated in the middle of the bench, side by side. Greg felt a shiver of pleasure when John chose to sit down next to him. "Come on Sherlock," said John. "Now that that's over, get on with it and tell us how you did it."
Sherlock leapt to his feet, turning to face them with a swirl of his coat, as he prepared for a delivery worthy of the drama of the occasion. Greg casually put his arm along the top of the bench behind John's back, not touching but close enough that if John just leaned back a little....
John leaned back. Then he put his left hand on Greg's thigh, while with his right he started to distribute bread crumbs to the crowd of ducks. Greg pressed into the warmth of John's body and listened to Sherlock expound on his cleverness.
He'd been right after all. It was a day for happiness.
- THE END -
Rating: PG
Warnings: none
Genre: drama
Word Count: Around 3150
Summary: Sherlock's return proves more complicated than any of them envisaged.
"Greg! Can you get over to Baker Street? There's something you've got to see."
Greg smiled at the memory as he emerged from the glare of Baker Street tube station into the afternoon sunlight of a beautiful spring day. He shouldn't have left work for several hours yet but the joy in John's voice had been too good to ignore. John had called him. John had wanted him to come over. John's voice had been alight with happiness.
He made a mental grimace at his own fluttering pleasure. He was far too old to feel like this about someone else. Men fast closing in on fifty, let alone hardened, cynical coppers with tarnished careers and battered hearts, were not supposed to be shivering inside with all the delight of a first crush. But he couldn't help the spring in his step as he strode along the pavement towards 221b.
John was happy and John had called him.
Their thing for which Greg could still not quite find a name had not had its origins in happiness. In Greg's mind there were three stages in what he thought of as the era PS, post-Sherlock. The first stage had been six months of grinding misery as Greg had tried to salvage his own career and survive the dislike and disdain manifested by so many of his colleagues, while watching John flounder through a swamp of misery, living his life as if barely conscious.
He had taken John out for a drink every Thursday, in the vain hope that if he didn't intrude on the weekends, John might eventually resume some kind of social life. For weeks they'd sat in gloomy silence, staring into their respective beverages, every topic they had in common a minefield of pain and unresolved anger. Still, Greg had asked every Thursday, just to be sure John had survived another week, and John had never said no.
Then suddenly John had seemed to pull himself together, so abruptly that Greg suspected there was a post-it in John's wallet, telling himself to get a life. John had started to enquire about Greg's job. Fortunately by then the internal investigation had found no irregularities in any of the investigations that had involved Sherlock, and the threat of dismissal or forced resignation had receded somewhat, although Greg was damn sure he'd never be promoted again. They'd manage to laugh awkwardly about some of the more bizarre aspects of the investigation.
John had started to talk about Sherlock again too. Asking Greg for stories of the detective from before John met him, telling stories of his time coming to terms with his unique flatmate. Their shared affection for Sherlock had made that laughter a little easier, even as it brought back the pang of loss every time.
And John had started to date again, to date the sweetest, blandest, most ordinary girls he could find. Sherlock would have despised every one of them. Even Greg had been taken aback by how aggressively banal they all were, as if John was determined that nothing extraordinary would ever happen to him again. Greg had soon given up worrying about some spectacularly ill-advised rebound marriage, as John had proved as adept at sabotaging his own romances as Sherlock had ever been. Every month there had been a a new one, with John determinedly, painfully optimistic that this was the one. And every time before the month was out it was over.
What Greg thought of as phase three had begun so late on a Saturday night that it was early Sunday morning. A drunken John had hammered on his door, having apparently just broken up with the most serious of all his attempts, a pretty mouse of girl called Mary.
But his troubles with Mary had lasted barely five minutes into the conversation. After that it was Sherlock, all Sherlock. John's anger, his bitterness, his frustration, his sense of utter betrayal, his bottomless grief. The good little soldier had finally cracked and he'd ended up flailing wildly at Greg, too drunk and too upset to even hit straight. Greg had wrestled him into a rough embrace, trying to contain the wild movements before John hurt himself. He'd got a mouth full of tongue for his troubles.
He'd meant to stop it, he really had. But he hadn't had sex since the last round with his wife, a toxic mix of anger and nostalgia after they emerged from the lawyer's office having signed the divorce agreement. And he'd had his own long months of grief and frustration and depression weighing down on him. He'd torn open both their trouser-fronts, grabbed the back of John' neck with one hand and both their cocks with the other and tugged ruthlessly until they'd both spilt hot come over Greg's hand. John had stumbled out soon after and Greg had assumed he'd not be seeing him again any time soon.
He hadn't texted to confirm their Thursday night drink as he usually did. But John had. They'd drunk. They'd talked about Sherlock. John hadn't brought up any new girlfriends. They'd not discussed it. Ten days later Greg had stood with the bodies of two dead children, signs of some kind of abusive ritual, a few scraps of contradictory evidence and a fierce longing for Sherlock and his insight. He'd texted John. The evening had ended in a half-dressed tangle on Greg's sofa, empty pizza boxes pushed to one side, Die Hard II rumbling in the background.
They still didn't talk about it. It needed a crisis each time, John having a patient die, Greg being threatened with another internal investigation, John having a run-in with Mycroft, Greg blamed in the tabloids for the stalled investigation of the child murders. Each time they fucked in and round and through the ghost of Sherlock, through the love and grief and anger that bound them together.
But it eased slowly, as time passed inexorably. The crises became smaller. John's idiot patients convinced that the common cold was a precursor to a brain tumour. Greg's idiot superiors who couldn't even sign off on a budget for coffee at the Yard. More and more often there was wry humour under the excuse, a tacit acknowledgement that it had become a game, even if neither of them could quite let go of the ritual of the excuse. Greg increasingly felt that they saw each other, John and Greg, with Sherlock becoming a bitter-sweet shared memory, rather than seeing Sherlock's side-kick and Sherlock's pet detective.
And now John had called him. John, bubbling with excitement, with something he wanted to share with Greg. No excuse, no crisis. Greg bounded up the steps, two stairs at a time, heart light, hoping that this might be the start of stage four, a chance to move forward with Sherlock always part of their shared past but with a future that would belong to them. Hoping this might be a day for happiness.
"So, what's up with you, then?" said Greg as he pushed through the door, eyes searching out John. It took him a moment to realise that the other man had company. Another moment to process who that company was.
"Greg! Look who's come home!"
Greg stared at the lanky form of Sherlock and thought with distant amazement that he'd not realised that a heart could mend and break at the same time. He glanced over at John, took in the sparkling blue eyes, the broad smile, the lines of weariness that he'd traced so often with his fingers now eliminated by radiant happiness.
Sherlock was back. All was well. John was as enthralled as ever. And it was his cue to step back into the shadows like the obedient minor supporting actor he'd always been in the drama that was the life of Sherlock. He felt sick.
"Nothing to say, Inspector?" demanded Sherlock. "At a loss for words as usual. I see some things haven't changed in my absence. God know how your department survived without me. Badly, I suspect. Well, don't you want to know how I did it?"
Greg glanced back at John, burning with happiness, apparently eager to hear Sherlock's tale of wonder, all grief and anger miraculously forgotten. He thought back to one of those whispered conversations, late at night, John's face buried against Greg's neck. John confessing how often he'd thought of suicide during those first months. How he'd not wanted to use his gun in case his possession of an unregistered firearm somehow got Greg into even more trouble. How he'd made a list of all the other ways he could do it, working out which one would be most fool-proof while being the least trouble to his friends.
Out of all that confession, it was that last thought that had hurt Greg most. That good little soldier John had not wanted his death to be any trouble. Not like Sherlock and his rooftop dramas, not like Sherlock and his escalating game of confrontation with his nemesis, drawing all that loved him into the danger zone. And after all that, none of it had been true. They'd all continued to be the silly little pawns they'd always been, being moved hither and yon to suit Sherlock's delusions of deity, their emotions a curious weakness to be batted away with all the concern offered to a house fly.
Greg felt his hands drawing up into tight fists. If he'd been twenty years younger, he'd have knocked Sherlock down there and then. But he'd learnt control with age, just as he'd learnt the bitter truth of his own lack of importance in the scheme of things.
He turned back to Sherlock, who was quivering like a greyhound in his eagerness to share his own cleverness.
"Fuck you."
Greg turned, walked out of the door, down the stairs and back into the spring sunlight. He hesitated for a moment, blinking hard to contain the prickling of his eyes. He couldn't bear to go back to his flat, with its memories of John laughing on his sofa, John messing about his kitchen, John asleep in his bed. He couldn't face his work again. And if Sherlock came anywhere near his department ever again, he was putting in for an immediate transfer to North Yorkshire. He walked moodily in the direction of Regent's Park, clenched fists buried in the pockets of his coat, trying to talk his battered heart through yet another loss. How many could you take, he wondered, before the damage ran so deep that you couldn't ever love again?
He ended up sitting on a bench, staring moodily at the Boating Lake, a large drake giving him a beady eye, clearly displeased by the lack of food on offer. "Piss off," Greg said to it. "You and me both, mate. No scraps coming our way. Better bloody well get used to it."
Footsteps approached. Greg kept his head down, in no mood for eye contact with anyone. Still something about the deliberate tread clearly targeted at his bench told him this was not a stranger. John. It had to be. Of course sweet, concerned, well-mannered John would have come after him, despite his desire to spend every minute of the rest of his life with Sherlock. At moments like this Greg wished desperately that John was a little more selfish.
Now there would have to be an awkward discussion, John being apologetic, Greg being polite, John trying to let him down gently, Greg trying to hurry the process along. God, it was going to be unbearable. Maybe he should just tell John to fuck off, too, but that would be like kicking a puppy. And Greg couldn't bring himself to hurt John like that. He'd made enough of a fool of himself already, walking out like that, as much of a drama queen as Sherlock had ever been. He'd have to apologise. He'd have to patch things up and then ease himself out of John's life gently. Christ, what a mess.
"I had worked out odds on various possible reactions but I have to say that your response was unexpected."
Sherlock. Definitely unexpected.
One pair of shoes. He was on his own. John must have sent him. Nothing else made sense.
"There was no need to walk out. I do not intend to end your... you know, your thing with John."
Greg's head shot up. "He told you?" He looked hard at Sherlock. He might not have the other man's skills of observation but that didn't mean he was blind. "No, he didn't, did he?" Greg thought quickly. "You've been watching us?" He jumped up onto his feet. "You have, haven't you. You bastard! You've had us under observation!"
He grabbed the lapels of Sherlock's stupid black bat coat. This time he had no intention of restraining his anger. "You've been watching us like some kind of lab rats. Amusing yourself by observing our attempts to cope. How could you? Did you see what your death did to John? Did you see the hurt he carried, week after week, month after month? Did you care, at all? Or was it all just part of your little game?"
"Lestrade, no, it wasn't like that." To Greg's surprise, Sherlock put his hands up over Greg's, where he still clung to the other man's coat. To his knowledge, Sherlock never voluntarily touched other people. "I had no choice. I was protecting you both."
"Protecting him?" Greg shook Sherlock loose and took a step backwards. "Do you know how close he came to killing himself?"
"I didn't expect him to care that much. I didn't realise. But Greg, I had no choice. They were going to kill him. They were going to kill you. The only way I could find to keep you safe was to disappear."
"What changed?" demanded Greg.
"I finally got rid of the last of the Moriarty's spawn, his inner circle of henchmen and associates. Mycroft is mopping up the remnants."
"And you couldn't have trusted me to help you? You couldn't have found a way to give John a hint?"
"I thought it would be safer and faster to work on my own. No one I cared about that they could use against me. No one's stupidity to slow me down. Finally free to weave my web of revenge without distractions."
Greg looked at Sherlock, really looked, and saw the changes he'd missed in his initial shock. Sherlock was thin again, nearly as thin as when Greg had first stumbled over the junkie wraith with the sharp tongue in a squat. But his eyes were clear this time and his gaze steady, open to Greg in a way he'd never seen before. There were lines on that once alabaster-smooth face and he looked considerably more than eighteen months older.
Greg sat down on the bench again, suddenly terribly tired. "You thought. Does that mean that's not quite how it worked out?"
Sherlock sat down next to him. The drake, scared off by their confrontation, returned cautiously, accompanied by some hopeful friends. "I didn't like it," said Sherlock, with an abrupt petulance that made him sound young again. "I didn't have anyone to talk to. I didn't have anyone to help me. It was..., I was...."
"What?"
"Lonely. Miserable. I hated it!" Sherlock sounded aggrieved, as if this turn of events was quite inexplicable to him. "I watched you both, to be sure you were safe. But also... I watched to..." His voice trailed into silence. Greg felt his heart quietly break again.
"I didn't mind it, you and John," Sherlock continued earnestly. "You're a lot better than any of those awful women he chooses. And you won't get in the way of investigations. It's quite convenient, really."
"Sherlock," Greg protested, half annoyed, half amused, just like the old days. "You can't just grant me some bit of John's time. It doesn't work like that." And he didn't want the scraps, he thought. He didn't want to be the consolation prize to be pulled out of the cupboard on the rare occasion that John had been abandoned by Sherlock.
"Why not?" demanded Sherlock, aggrieved. "It's perfectly fair. I'm sharing him with you and you with him. It works."
"You are sharing me with him?" queried Greg. "What's that supposed to mean?"
Sherlock stared at him, as if all his direst suspicions about Greg's lack of mental acuity had finally been confirmed. "Well, you're my Detective Inspector."
Greg buried his head in his hands and started to chuckle. Startled, the ducks fluttered and scattered. Eventually Greg looked up at Sherlock's perplexed face, Sherlock's oh-so-very-alive face, screwed up in annoyance, and let go completely. Let the laughter shake right through his body, let it shake back into place some of the pieces of his heart.
"Maybe we should ask John what he thinks," said Greg at last.
Sherlock brightened and began texting furiously. He showed it to Greg as he pressed send.
In Regents Park.
Come now.
Bring duck food.
John joined them suspiciously quickly, quick enough to make Greg think he'd had them both under surveillance.
"That was a bit dramatic," John said to Greg.
"Sorry," offered Greg with an apologetic shrug. He tried to work out where to start with an explanation but John cut him off.
"It's okay, Sherlock has that affect on people."
Greg and Sherlock were seated in the middle of the bench, side by side. Greg felt a shiver of pleasure when John chose to sit down next to him. "Come on Sherlock," said John. "Now that that's over, get on with it and tell us how you did it."
Sherlock leapt to his feet, turning to face them with a swirl of his coat, as he prepared for a delivery worthy of the drama of the occasion. Greg casually put his arm along the top of the bench behind John's back, not touching but close enough that if John just leaned back a little....
John leaned back. Then he put his left hand on Greg's thigh, while with his right he started to distribute bread crumbs to the crowd of ducks. Greg pressed into the warmth of John's body and listened to Sherlock expound on his cleverness.
He'd been right after all. It was a day for happiness.
- THE END -