And now for something completely different!
Title: Knockin' At My Cellar Door
Characters/Pairings: Sherlock/Moriarty
Rating: R
Word Count: ~800
Content advisory: references to drug use, roleplay
Notes: Written for Fandom Stocking 2013 for
katemacetakSummary: Sherlock can't stay away from Moriarty, but he can't be himself, either.
After the trial, there’s no reason for Jim to hide. Sherlock couldn’t hurt him, not with the full force of Crown law behind him, so the next move is Jim’s.
He does so like to play cat and mouse, and Sherlock obliges him by ferreting out each new lair. Once he’s found the place Jim lays his head, Sherlock crafts a disguise for himself-a British Gas technician, a nosy neighbor, an aged panhandler-and waits for Jim to suss him out. Each disguise is like a gift: a new face of Sherlock for Jim to unwrap. And unwrap, and unwrap.
The real reason Sherlock comes to him, Jim has realized, is not for to prove he’s keeping an eye on him, but to experience the thrill of Jim unraveling him in each new personification.
It’s bitterly cold the week Jim takes a penthouse flat in Islington. This time, Sherlock does not wait for Jim to recognize and approach him. Instead, he scurries up to Jim before he’s registered him as more than a blur learning against the wall of Jim’s building. “Do you have it?” he hisses. “I know you do.”
Jim gives Sherlock his full attention. He is underdressed for the winter chill in a collarless shirt that exposes one too-sharp collarbone, tight jeans with a patch worn through on the inner thigh, and laceless boots. His normally lush hair looks lank and greasy, hanging in his eyes. He’s managed to capture the bloodshot eyes of an addict, but the glint is more playful than desperate. Jim knows desperate; he trades on it.
Sherlock leans in close to Jim, stooping casually so he doesn’t loom, making himself look weak and helpless, and bites out, “They said you could help me.”
Jim grins, marveling at the way Sherlock commits wholeheartedly to the part, at his confidence that Jim will play along. And of course he will. There’s nothing more intoxicating than disappearing into a game with Sherlock. Jim slides his hands into his pockets, dropping into the character of a haughty drug dealer. “You’ve got the wrong guy, sweetheart,” he says, and turns to saunter away.
Sherlock’s barked, “Please,” stops Jim, and he turns around with an expectant raise of his eyebrows. “I can pay.”
Jim drags his eyes up and down over Sherlock’s lean form, noting with appreciation the little details he’s put into this guise: the tremor in his hand, the burn on his shirt sleeve, the shallow breath heaving his narrow chest. He locks eyes with Sherlock and shakes his head. “You clearly don’t have enough money to buy hot tea, let alone anything I might have on offer. No capital stored away for a rainy day; you’ve been an addict for years, so anything you have to trade is long gone.” Jim prowls forward, stops a foot away from Sherlock, but leans his face in close to whisper into Sherlock’s ear. “What do you have that I could possibly want?”
Sherlock licks his lips, the pink tip of his tongue lingering in the corner of his mouth, mimicking uncertainty. “I’ll do whatever you like.”
“What do you think that I like?”
Sherlock opens his mouth to reply, but his words don’t emerge. Jim can see him consciously sorting through every possibility, letting his eyes go dark with feigned unease. He closes his mouth.
“Come on, then.” Jim turns his key in the door and pushes open the building; he doesn’t hold it for Sherlock, but rather lets him scramble through on his own.
When they make it to Jim’s bedroom, Sherlock is weak beneath him, holding back the wiry strength Jim knows he has and letting himself go limp and pliant, a fragile doll Jim can move as he likes. Sherlock plays his part with delight, his pride subsumed into the role as he pants his pleasure into the sheets.
The desperation Jim had missed earlier arrives now, not part of Sherlock’s vulnerable character, but his true self showing where Jim has bitten and sucked and stroked and screwed himself down past Sherlock’s facade.
When they’re tangled together, giggling and naked in the aftermath of their tryst, Sherlock says, “That’s been your favourite so far.”
Jim traces his finger up the vein of Sherlock’s arm, past the crook of the elbow where pin pricks are standing in for holes a needle might have torn. “I wish I’d known you back then. I would have been so bad for you.”
Sherlock rolls on top of Jim, crushes their mouths together once, then says, “You’re bad for me now.”
Jim tugs him down to play with his mouth again, because as long as he keeps doing this, Sherlock won’t realize how right he is.