beyond the gravestones (sherlock/johnlock fanfic)

Chapter 10

It was a wild, tempestuous day, and the wind furiously rattled the windows of 221B Baker Street. Outside, only a few raincoat-clad figures battled through the rain, and even cars were minimal. Sherlock stood by the window and watched the downpour. Good day for the criminals, he thought, Nature itself will clean away the evidence of most crimes, if Scotland Yard doesn't do it first.

Deep down, he rather hoped he would get called out on some bizarre errand. It had been a somewhat dull week since their visit to Sherrinford. Clients were boring, John was busy with work, Rosie slept a lot, and Sherlock still couldn't make head or tail of Yardley Oliver's case. He had grudgingly admitted that John was right; there was no connection between Irene Adler and James' murder. It was simply a coincidence. However, he still couldn't shake the feeling that something was off about the whole thing. Hadn't he said it himself? The universe is rarely so lazy.

Irene Adler had dropped by a few times to talk about the case. For some reason, whenever she visited, she made sure that John wasn't around. Sherlock had almost come to regard her as an acquaintance now. Neither of them talked about Eurus or Sherrinford, but he would often get a bad taste in his mouth, and an overwhelming need to apologize.

"Sherlock. Listen to me."

Sherlock turned around to find John staring at him, frowning slightly.

"You have got to stop blaming yourself for what Eurus did." John said.

Uncanny, thought Sherlock, almost like he read my mind. "I'm at least partially the reason why she's in Sherrinford in the first place."

"No, you aren't. You've seen what she can do. Nothing justifies cold-blooded murder. She killed a boy when she was just a child herself."

"I haven't forgiven her for that, but she was lonely. If I hadn't neglected her so much - "

"- she would still have turned out the same. What happened to her is not your fault. It's in her biology. There are other ways to deal with loneliness, and murder is not one of them." John stood up and joined him at the window. "I never thought I'd say this to you, but you're letting emotion cloud your judgement. Eurus is dangerous. Even Mycroft sees it. Why can't you?"

"I don't deny the fact that she's dangerous. But with proper care - "

"There's no fixing her, Sherlock. She's twisted beyond measure. You can play your duets and baby her, but that's not going to change the fact that if you remove that glass, bad things are going to happen. She's bottling up years of isolation and resentment, and she's too clever."

Sherlock watched John out of the corner of his eye. He thought back to their meeting with Eurus, to the way John had reacted when she brought up the well...

"You really hate her."

"I don't. I just see her for what she really is."

"That well..." he hesitated, "Why has it traumatized you to this extent? Surely you've seen worse."

John laughed bitterly. "Oh, it runs much deeper than a stupid well."

John's face was an inscrutable mask, and Sherlock got the distinct feeling that he was hiding some deep, dark secret. He would ask, but he could see that John needed some time to sort through whatever he was feeling. After all, John hadn't forced him to open up about Irene Adler in front of the fireplace that night. This brought him back the original problem: how badly he wanted to cuddle with John again, to settle his head in the crook of John's neck and fall asleep like that.

Sherlock wondered if John knew how much courage it had taken just to put his head on his shoulder that night. He was still terrified that he might go too far and John would cut himself off, and he couldn't let that happen. He just couldn't. John was too precious to lose. He was the only one who Sherlock laughed with, rather than at. He put up with all of Sherlock's tantrums and eccentricity, and somehow still loved him for it. He even made lazy days at Baker Street bearable.