A Golden Opportunity

So You Remember

"Here it is, North Main!" Victor exclaimed, pulling upon the wheel of the car and turning sharply along the appropriate road. Sherlock Holmes clenched his mouth shut, as if he was now holding back vomit. "We're looking for number 470," Victor announced obviously, as if his passenger had not been writing to that address since before he was born.
"This is 459," Professor Holmes muttered, a voice so far away it might have been whispering from the backseat. Victor nodded, slowing his pace so the two of them could examine the house numbers from afar. Thankfully there was no traffic on either side, allowing their car to creep as slowly as it needed to in an attempt to observe and prepare for what would happen when they reached 70. What would happen when they were faced with the house they had come for...the house that wasn't expecting them.
"There," Professor Holmes whispered, knocking his head lightly against the glass of the car window to gesture to the house they sought. The house of John Watson. "It's there."
Victor nodded wordlessly, pulling their car some parking spots behind along the curb, trying to give the pair ample room to build their courage as they walked. Finally the engine was shut off, the scene was set, and the time had come. Yesterday they were lamenting in a hospital room, and today they were exactly where God had intended them to travel. They were exactly where Sherlock Holmes needed to be.
"I'll get the chair," Victor muttered, keeping his voice low so as not to alarm the old man who had gone rigid in the seat next to him. He was so milky white it seemed possible he had died in the hotel room and Victor had been driving his ghost around for the duration of their trip. The boy bounded out of the car, thankful for the opportunity to stretch his legs, thankful for any way to get his anxiety out other than easing his foot off the gas pedal. Victor felt as if he should run a mile down and back on the road, anything to loosen his legs and loosen his breath, anything to work on exhausting the fear that was now lumping itself in his throat.
Victor wrestled the wheelchair from the back seat of the car, unfolding it on the sidewalk with a metallic racket and chuckling to see the hospital logo stamped into the back of the fabric. This wheelchair was a long way from home, and rightfully so. It had a mission better than any other wheelchair, it had a purpose beyond its usual capacity. The Professor had the car door open, his feet swung around towards the pavement and his eyes alight with the most intense determination Victor had ever expected from a man his age. His eyes had always been his most telling feature, the ones which hardly seemed to age when the rest of his body was withering. Today the passion was masking the intelligence, it was masking the deliberate nature he so often demonstrated. Today he was irrational, today he was sensational, today he was downright insane. Today his eyes reflected all of the regret, all of the stagnation, all of the stubbornness. Today he was ready to find an answer.
Professor Holmes rose to get into the wheelchair, folding his walking stick across his lap in the slight chance he would need it. He seemed prepared for anything, as if Victor was wheeling him back to the frontlines of the Second World War. The plastic grips were slick with sweat, Victor's palms trembling as he struggled with the surprisingly heavy weight of the Professor. Perhaps in his determination he had gained a couple of pounds, or else his frail bones had suddenly become lined with lead. Perhaps it was Victor's hesitation that made him struggle, as if his body was rejecting all actions he took to move forward. His very muscles could tell this was a bad idea, and yet his brain persisted, his brain manually lifted his legs, his muscles, his joints. His brain propelled his body forward and thus the Professor approached, with each turn of the wheel another victory and another step forward in the life he had deliberately disallowed himself from living.
"Are you alright?" Victor wondered as they approached the house, the gaps in the sidewalk jerking the old man around and making the wheelchair creak in defense.
"I'm fine, Victor," Professor Holmes whispered, his voice croaking in disuse, so painful to hear that Victor worried his first words to John Watson would be indistinguishable from the song of a frog.
"Right," Victor muttered, remarkably unconfident as he finally turned the wheelchair up the sidewalk of 470. He could hardly move, he could hardly pray. The house had but one stoop, and it was in front of this Victor stopped the wheelchair, kicking the break upon the back wheel to ensure the thing did not roll away.
"Do you want to ring the bell, or shall I?" Victor wondered, his voice cracking as he stared upon the front door, the doorbell, and the letterbox. The letter box...how many of Professor Holmes's letters did it see? How many did it get, how many did it reject? How many were set back inside, destined back to the post office and into the hands of their loving sender?
Professor Holmes seemed to have noticed it to, though his spirit was resilient. He merely twitched his hands towards the bell, the signal that Victor ought to be the one to ring it. The boy nodded, stepping up to the bell and wringing his hands together, finding that it was suddenly difficult to so much as keep his head upright, much less lift his fingers to the button. He looked back, looking again at his old Professor, the withered old fool sat upright in his wheelchair, his infected legs hanging limply towards the sidewalk, his eyes so brilliant with their power it seemed unnecessary to speak a word to the man at the door. Everything he intended was right there in his gaze, everything that Victor had promised to help him recover. Everything he had to do. Everything that he was destined to do. Victor raised his hand, trembling, and pressed it firmly into the thin plastic of the doorbell. He pressed it so hard he could feel the resistance of the brick wall behind, holding it there, holding it in his urgency. His stomach twisted and finally Victor let go, stepping back in his horror, stepping back at the sudden realization of what was destined to happen. Fifty years of waiting was about to come to a close. Fifty years of questioning was about to be answered. Fifty years of longing was about to be decided.
"Be ready, Professor," Victor whispered, near to tears as he listened to the melody of the doorbell ringing throughout the inside of the house, the sort of programmed song that was purchased on infomercials and wired poorly. It was a static rendition of the national anthem, a flashback to the war times, a flashback to the man who sat in the chair. Did John Watson regard his time in the military as positive? Did he wish back to it, remember back to it? Victor couldn't allow himself to hope. He felt ready to vomit at the song, and knew from this day forward he wouldn't be able to hear it the same way again. Though if that thought would be positive or negative...that remained unclear. That remained to be determined...and quickly. Quickly now, quickly that he heard footsteps approaching.
Victor leapt off the front stoop, jumping to his place behind the chair so as to hide behind the old man. He was suddenly afraid, afraid of being caught in the middle of the most overdue reunion. He could hardly breathe as he heard the door begin to open, the hinges begin to shriek, the conversation flowing out of the house, the liveliness...the woman. The woman at the door. The old woman.
"Can I help you?" she asked through the screen of the door, her back crooked and her hair bleached white. She was wrinkled and beautiful, undeniably the woman in the photograph, undeniably a Watson. Victor swallowed hard, trying to think of an answer to that question, trying to remember how to speak, how to...how to breathe.
"Is your husband home?" Sherlock Holmes asked, his voice confident but failing. The woman looked suspicious from the time she opened the door, though by now she seemed downright frightened. They would know now, wouldn't they? They would know now if he was dead.
"Who is asking?" she wondered. "I needn't anymore encyclopedias, nor do we have any use for new religions. Though you'd make for a funny salesman."
"We're not selling..." Victor's voice fell short.
"Is John Watson home?" Sherlock asked, this time more adamantly, this time matching his tone to his eyes. This was enough, it would seem. Enough to make his purpose clear.
"I'll fetch him for you," the woman decided at last, staring at the new visitors with a renewed suspicion, though indeed less of a fear. She was curious about them, though if they meant her any harm certainly they would have acted on it. Slowly she turned, moving as slow as Professor Holmes might have if he was given the ability to walk. She moved back into the house, back towards the lively voices, back into her home.
"So he's alive," Victor whispered, almost unable to believe it. He couldn't be sure if that was a good thing or not. He almost wanted the man to be dead, so as to give proper reasoning for the failure to respond to letters. Professor Holmes was twitching now, his face contorting so as to keep the tears from falling down his wrinkled cheeks. He could hardly breathe, it would seem, and yet he was continually leaning forward, as if he was trying to force his momentum as close to John Watson as he could physically get. He was anticipating the reunion, anticipating the feeling. Anticipating the words...the man...the embrace. Even Victor could feel his own leg tingling, the ghostly wound deepening itself into his hip as if to mark them both with the imprint of John Watson's craftsmanship.
A shape was moving towards the door, now through the screen there was the shadow of a man growing taller with every step. There were three legs moving at once, one which was clopping hard upon the wooden floors, a walking stick that was curved wood, a beautiful piece designed to keep its user upright. He was still but a shape, though by now Professor Holmes had already begun to struggle, pulling his own walking stick out from his lap and slamming it determinedly into the concrete. So he would not meet his lover sitting down, he would meet him at eye level, he would meet him at the height and prowess in which they were first introduced. The old man pulled himself up, groaning with the effort, sapping his energy and leaning wildly upon the stick as he rose. And yet still he stood, he stood to meet the man in the door, he stood to watch as the shape came up to the screen, separated now by mesh rather than miles. Separated now by the blank look in John Watson's eyes, the look that seemed to understand something important was happening within knowing yet the magnitude of the reintroduction.