Baker Street Boys

24

//SMUT WARNING//

"John had shown up at Baker Street only one day prior, an army duffle slung over his shoulder, the expression on his face like a cracked and ruptured fault line. Sherlock stood aside, holding open the door, and let John ascend the stairs in silence, asking nothing of Mary, asking nothing at all. "

The only sounds in the flat are the crackling of the fire and John's wedding ring tapping against his glass of scotch.

Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

It goes on and on, steady and incessant, like a broken faucet, and Sherlock thinks of Chinese water torture, of being held down by the boys a year above him and the tapping between his eyes, slowly and surely until he screamed from the pain, like he wants to now. He stays silent.

It's been an hour since either of them said anything and Sherlock is certain John hasn't taken one drink from that glass, completely unoccupied by the task at hand, just as Sherlock is with the microscope before him. He stares through the lens at water molecules, pretending the information they present is important, pressing, when all he sees is hydrogen and oxygen dancing around each other.

Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

John had shown up at Baker Street only one day prior, an army duffle slung over his shoulder, the expression on his face like a cracked and ruptured fault line. Sherlock stood aside, holding open the door, and let John ascend the stairs in silence, asking nothing of Mary, asking nothing at all. Sherlock was sure he'd feel euphoric if John ever stood at his doorstep with belongings in hand, if he ever returned to 221b to stay, but Sherlock only felt himself evaporating among the ambiguity of John's presence. This wasn't John leaving Mary, this was ... this was something else entirely, something Sherlock couldn't deduce, couldn't work out without asking John questions and honestly, it looked like one well-placed inquiry from Sherlock would knock him over.

So Sherlock stayed silent as John traipsed up the stairs, followed him as dumped his duffle on the landing and then shuffled into the kitchen to make tea for them both. That was nice, and though Sherlock still could make nothing of the situation, he enjoyed the earl grey as only John could brew it.

John stayed silent too, as they sat and sipped, and he stared out the window, his face as gray as the city itself. He finally spoke once Sherlock had downed the dregs of his tea and John's had gone cold, barely touched, in his hand.

"Could I ... can I stay ... here ... just for a bit?" John asked it of the window, or at least seemed to as his eyes were glued to the panes and remained that way.

Sherlock cleared his throat to reply but John spoke again.

"I need some time ... some time to ... think."

So the decision was still unmade. Sherlock scolded himself for being disappointed, surprised. His wife is pregnant, you unassailable git, and you keep getting in the way. He's not going to pick you. Idiot.

He knew then John would not stay long at Baker Street and Sherlock floundered for a way to tell him how much he was wanted there, in their rooms. He coughed lightly and breathed deeply, setting down his cup and saucer.

"John, there will never be a day that you are not welcome at 221b for any length of time you wish."

Unfocused eyes finally slid from the window over to Sherlock's and while the rest of his face still clouded like a storm, the left side of John's mouth raised and Sherlock suppressed a shiver. It was a gift to have John in any way after what he'd put him through, Sherlock takes that to heart every minute of his life, and when John smiles — half or otherwise — Sherlock sometimes feels he could melt on the spot. That smile. He would cross great, freezing tundras and hack through sweaty, dripping jungles to rend a smile from John.