Patterned Red and Grey
Title: Patterned Red and Grey
Author: sariagray
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: Sherlock/John, Harry, Mrs. Hudson, Molly, Lestrade, Ella Thompson
Word Count: ~1500
Warnings: None.
Summary: John grieves. Is it always going to be this quiet? Post-Reichenbach.
Beta: analineblue
Disclaimer: Do not own.
Author Notes: Special thanks to analineblue, who looked this over twice for me…even though it was her birthday. Because she is marvelous. This felt good to write, for whatever reason.
Patterned Red and Grey
Are you hungry?
No, of course you aren’t.
Not tired either, I guess.
You never are.
--
“I’ve never been a religious man,” John says.
It’s been three minutes of silence. Once, that would have been a blessing. Now it just feels uncomfortable. Ella nods at him, encouraging.
“Tried to be. It’s easy to pray when you’re - um - when you’re being shot at.”
He shifts his legs, runs his hands down his thighs until they grip his knees.
“What is it about religion that you don’t like, John?”
He pauses, considering. At least, he tries to look like he’s considering. Instead, he’s counting the frayed threads on the cuff of his jacket.
“I don’t dislike it. It’s just - it’s not something that I...I just can’t believe that there’s something else out there.”
“That’s perfectly acceptable.”
No, he thinks. No, it really isn’t.
--
I hope you aren’t smoking again.
I really don’t care, actually.
Are you hungry?
No, of course you aren’t.
--
There are apples going to rot on the counter. He’d bought them in a bit of a fit, and now they make the air in the kitchen heavy and sweet. He can’t figure out why he doesn’t just throw them out, why they instead form a strange altar to decomposition next to the electric kettle. There will likely be bugs soon.
Are apples dead, once they’ve been picked? Were they ever alive to begin with?
They are brown and mushy, and there are sticky rings of wet around them that the remaining rational part of him wants to wipe up with a bit of disinfectant. The refrigerator is empty again, although he doesn’t remember eating any of the food he’d bought last week. He certainly never touched the apples, so where the rest of it went is beyond him.
Sometimes he yells, just to stab the silence. Mrs. Hudson has long since stopped coming upstairs to check on him when he does this, but he doesn’t feel like making noise at all right now.
He’s been standing in the kitchen for almost two hours, with the refrigerator door open. His head has been throbbing for days, a quiet ache that makes him want to scoop out his brains. Maybe then all of the aches would go away.
--
Are you warm enough?
Or cool enough?
I hope you aren’t smoking again.
I really don’t care, actually.
--
Harry tells him that he’s falling apart.
“John,” she says, “you’re falling apart.”
He just fixates on the falling, which he does every night as he finally drifts off to sleep only to be awoken by his body jerking. He is always falling - he just never lands.
“Are you listening to me?”
No. “Yes, of course. I’m falling apart.”
“Right. You need to pull yourself together.”
He wants to laugh, but he knows how Harry feels (he’s been there, with her, their positions reversed - oh, a thousand times) and he’s not far enough gone to be cruel to her. So he nods instead.
“I know,” he says. “I will. I just - I just need time, yeah?”
She grabs his hand and squeezes. She’s sweet like this, she’s his sister-that-was. Her eyes are bright and mournful, her mouth neat and kind.
“Of course, anything you need.”
He watches her fingers toy with the sleeve to her paper coffee cup until she unravels it.
“You know,” she says, after a moment, “it’s fine if you loved him. You can tell me.”
There’s a cavern between them, and he could shout it across the distance in hopes that she might hear, but it really isn’t fine. He could tell her the reasons why it isn’t, but she wouldn’t hear those, either. He doesn’t know how to speak loudly enough anymore.
--
You left your violin leaning against the sofa.
I’m afraid to move it.
Are you warm enough?
Or cool enough?
--
Lestrade comes over once a week and offers him trips to the pub, and after a few weeks, asks for his opinion on cases. John obliges him sometimes, when the walls seem to cling to him too closely and the air is too thick to breathe. Other times, he just shakes his head and lets Lestrade in to sit in silence.
It does Greg more good than it does him, he thinks. He treats these visits like penance, as though John could absolve him of his guilt.
“How’s Mrs. Hudson?” he asks.
“Fine.”
“Let me know if she ever needs any help.”
He means John, of course. Mrs. Hudson is far more capable than he is right now. He’s just aware enough to admit it to himself.
Greg never stays long.
--
You never finished your tea.
It’s pretty disgusting now, actually.
You left your violin leaning against the sofa.
I’m afraid to move it.
--
It takes him two months to even think about clearing out the second bedroom. It takes him another two and a half weeks to start.
It’s easy at first, just a bit of anonymous clutter - a torn-up magazine, blank pages of paper, two towels, a half-full glass of water. When he gets to the closet, he stops and never goes back.
Mrs. Hudson offers to pack it away. So does Harry, and Greg, and even Mycroft (via one of his blank-faced assistants). He turns them all down with varying levels of politeness.
Molly comes over just once, and she slips into the bedroom before he can stop her, before he even notices she’s gone. She says she was going to help him with the sorting, but he can see the soft lump of something in her bag. When she leaves, quick and full of hasty sympathy, he checks: a scarf is missing.
It only makes him angry for a moment before he feels guilty - she must be hurting, too. He lets her keep it. He also doesn’t tell her that it used to be his before it had been commandeered. It doesn’t matter, anyway.
--
Why do you keep the windows open?
I’m surprised there aren’t birds nesting in here.
You never finished your tea.
It’s pretty disgusting now, actually.
--
Christmas comes.
John forgets, despite the decorations that litter his path to and from the grocery store, despite the music and the butter-sweet smells of baking wafting from Mrs. Hudson’s kitchen, despite the chill in the air.
He only remembers when comments begin to appear on his blog, on his latest entry (One sentence - Is it always going to be this quiet?) that was posted months ago, wishing him a happy Christmas, wondering how he’s holding up.
He hasn’t bought any gifts, obviously. He spends the evening watching a loop of It’s A Wonderful Life (he’s always had a bit of a masochistic streak, and the swell of the pain in his chest is at least something tangible) and eating cold cereal. He’s had worse Christmases, back when he’d had enough hope to be devastatingly disappointed. Still, this ranks up there on the scale of misery.
Christmas goes.
No surprise packages appear on the mantel, but then, he really wasn’t expecting anything.
--
This is stupid.
But I’m going to pretend you’re alive for awhile.
Why do you keep the windows open?
I’m surprised there aren’t birds nesting in here.
--
There are times when he feels almost compelled to go to the cemetery. His feet lead him without consulting his brain, and suddenly he’s in front of the solid, black headstone.
It’s in a nice spot, separate. It was ostentatious to the extreme (to assuage Mycroft’s guilt, he suspects), but he feels it’s symbolically appropriate. There are flowers here, only a little wilted, and he wonders who else made the journey. Perhaps a delivery man in Mycroft’s employ. That, sadly, makes the most sense.
He sits on the damp grass and stares. Ever since his final goodbye, he rarely speaks here. Even after death, even when facing an inanimate hunk of rock placed over bones and bits of decaying flesh that he can’t see, there are things he can’t quite bring himself to say out loud.
He stumbles over the words when he tries, or it all falls apart into a broken plea, or he babbles inane things that he would know better than to say if none of this had happened.
It’s raining. Lightly. It’s more mist than anything, and it’s cold.
“Happy New Year, Sherlock.”
--
I miss you.
You’re never going to read that.
This is stupid.
But I’m going to pretend you’re alive for awhile.
--
Sherlock closes out his new messages and puts down his phone. He leans back against the headboard of his temporary bed, steeples his fingers beneath his chin, and glances out of the window into the cold dark. Outside, the snow is swirling prettily. It’s hateful.
He wraps the scarf, patterned red and grey, tighter around him.
“Happy New Year, John.”
The End
Author: sariagray
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: Sherlock/John, Harry, Mrs. Hudson, Molly, Lestrade, Ella Thompson
Word Count: ~1500
Warnings: None.
Summary: John grieves. Is it always going to be this quiet? Post-Reichenbach.
Beta: analineblue
Disclaimer: Do not own.
Author Notes: Special thanks to analineblue, who looked this over twice for me…even though it was her birthday. Because she is marvelous. This felt good to write, for whatever reason.
Patterned Red and Grey
Are you hungry?
No, of course you aren’t.
Not tired either, I guess.
You never are.
--
“I’ve never been a religious man,” John says.
It’s been three minutes of silence. Once, that would have been a blessing. Now it just feels uncomfortable. Ella nods at him, encouraging.
“Tried to be. It’s easy to pray when you’re - um - when you’re being shot at.”
He shifts his legs, runs his hands down his thighs until they grip his knees.
“What is it about religion that you don’t like, John?”
He pauses, considering. At least, he tries to look like he’s considering. Instead, he’s counting the frayed threads on the cuff of his jacket.
“I don’t dislike it. It’s just - it’s not something that I...I just can’t believe that there’s something else out there.”
“That’s perfectly acceptable.”
No, he thinks. No, it really isn’t.
--
I hope you aren’t smoking again.
I really don’t care, actually.
Are you hungry?
No, of course you aren’t.
--
There are apples going to rot on the counter. He’d bought them in a bit of a fit, and now they make the air in the kitchen heavy and sweet. He can’t figure out why he doesn’t just throw them out, why they instead form a strange altar to decomposition next to the electric kettle. There will likely be bugs soon.
Are apples dead, once they’ve been picked? Were they ever alive to begin with?
They are brown and mushy, and there are sticky rings of wet around them that the remaining rational part of him wants to wipe up with a bit of disinfectant. The refrigerator is empty again, although he doesn’t remember eating any of the food he’d bought last week. He certainly never touched the apples, so where the rest of it went is beyond him.
Sometimes he yells, just to stab the silence. Mrs. Hudson has long since stopped coming upstairs to check on him when he does this, but he doesn’t feel like making noise at all right now.
He’s been standing in the kitchen for almost two hours, with the refrigerator door open. His head has been throbbing for days, a quiet ache that makes him want to scoop out his brains. Maybe then all of the aches would go away.
--
Are you warm enough?
Or cool enough?
I hope you aren’t smoking again.
I really don’t care, actually.
--
Harry tells him that he’s falling apart.
“John,” she says, “you’re falling apart.”
He just fixates on the falling, which he does every night as he finally drifts off to sleep only to be awoken by his body jerking. He is always falling - he just never lands.
“Are you listening to me?”
No. “Yes, of course. I’m falling apart.”
“Right. You need to pull yourself together.”
He wants to laugh, but he knows how Harry feels (he’s been there, with her, their positions reversed - oh, a thousand times) and he’s not far enough gone to be cruel to her. So he nods instead.
“I know,” he says. “I will. I just - I just need time, yeah?”
She grabs his hand and squeezes. She’s sweet like this, she’s his sister-that-was. Her eyes are bright and mournful, her mouth neat and kind.
“Of course, anything you need.”
He watches her fingers toy with the sleeve to her paper coffee cup until she unravels it.
“You know,” she says, after a moment, “it’s fine if you loved him. You can tell me.”
There’s a cavern between them, and he could shout it across the distance in hopes that she might hear, but it really isn’t fine. He could tell her the reasons why it isn’t, but she wouldn’t hear those, either. He doesn’t know how to speak loudly enough anymore.
--
You left your violin leaning against the sofa.
I’m afraid to move it.
Are you warm enough?
Or cool enough?
--
Lestrade comes over once a week and offers him trips to the pub, and after a few weeks, asks for his opinion on cases. John obliges him sometimes, when the walls seem to cling to him too closely and the air is too thick to breathe. Other times, he just shakes his head and lets Lestrade in to sit in silence.
It does Greg more good than it does him, he thinks. He treats these visits like penance, as though John could absolve him of his guilt.
“How’s Mrs. Hudson?” he asks.
“Fine.”
“Let me know if she ever needs any help.”
He means John, of course. Mrs. Hudson is far more capable than he is right now. He’s just aware enough to admit it to himself.
Greg never stays long.
--
You never finished your tea.
It’s pretty disgusting now, actually.
You left your violin leaning against the sofa.
I’m afraid to move it.
--
It takes him two months to even think about clearing out the second bedroom. It takes him another two and a half weeks to start.
It’s easy at first, just a bit of anonymous clutter - a torn-up magazine, blank pages of paper, two towels, a half-full glass of water. When he gets to the closet, he stops and never goes back.
Mrs. Hudson offers to pack it away. So does Harry, and Greg, and even Mycroft (via one of his blank-faced assistants). He turns them all down with varying levels of politeness.
Molly comes over just once, and she slips into the bedroom before he can stop her, before he even notices she’s gone. She says she was going to help him with the sorting, but he can see the soft lump of something in her bag. When she leaves, quick and full of hasty sympathy, he checks: a scarf is missing.
It only makes him angry for a moment before he feels guilty - she must be hurting, too. He lets her keep it. He also doesn’t tell her that it used to be his before it had been commandeered. It doesn’t matter, anyway.
--
Why do you keep the windows open?
I’m surprised there aren’t birds nesting in here.
You never finished your tea.
It’s pretty disgusting now, actually.
--
Christmas comes.
John forgets, despite the decorations that litter his path to and from the grocery store, despite the music and the butter-sweet smells of baking wafting from Mrs. Hudson’s kitchen, despite the chill in the air.
He only remembers when comments begin to appear on his blog, on his latest entry (One sentence - Is it always going to be this quiet?) that was posted months ago, wishing him a happy Christmas, wondering how he’s holding up.
He hasn’t bought any gifts, obviously. He spends the evening watching a loop of It’s A Wonderful Life (he’s always had a bit of a masochistic streak, and the swell of the pain in his chest is at least something tangible) and eating cold cereal. He’s had worse Christmases, back when he’d had enough hope to be devastatingly disappointed. Still, this ranks up there on the scale of misery.
Christmas goes.
No surprise packages appear on the mantel, but then, he really wasn’t expecting anything.
--
This is stupid.
But I’m going to pretend you’re alive for awhile.
Why do you keep the windows open?
I’m surprised there aren’t birds nesting in here.
--
There are times when he feels almost compelled to go to the cemetery. His feet lead him without consulting his brain, and suddenly he’s in front of the solid, black headstone.
It’s in a nice spot, separate. It was ostentatious to the extreme (to assuage Mycroft’s guilt, he suspects), but he feels it’s symbolically appropriate. There are flowers here, only a little wilted, and he wonders who else made the journey. Perhaps a delivery man in Mycroft’s employ. That, sadly, makes the most sense.
He sits on the damp grass and stares. Ever since his final goodbye, he rarely speaks here. Even after death, even when facing an inanimate hunk of rock placed over bones and bits of decaying flesh that he can’t see, there are things he can’t quite bring himself to say out loud.
He stumbles over the words when he tries, or it all falls apart into a broken plea, or he babbles inane things that he would know better than to say if none of this had happened.
It’s raining. Lightly. It’s more mist than anything, and it’s cold.
“Happy New Year, Sherlock.”
--
I miss you.
You’re never going to read that.
This is stupid.
But I’m going to pretend you’re alive for awhile.
--
Sherlock closes out his new messages and puts down his phone. He leans back against the headboard of his temporary bed, steeples his fingers beneath his chin, and glances out of the window into the cold dark. Outside, the snow is swirling prettily. It’s hateful.
He wraps the scarf, patterned red and grey, tighter around him.
“Happy New Year, John.”
The End