The Progress of Sherlock Holmes

Pattern Recognition

Fingers in place, (new, slightly inferior) bow hovering. The notes are already there, waiting to be rung. This immediate future is predetermined, predictable: the parameters are already set. There can be no future other than the one established by these key contingent factors: the pressure of my fingers, exactly in place, waiting. Pull the bow across the strings. The opening notes sound, perfectly, as predicted. The music (certain, uncomplicated) is the result of this small violence of hair against steel, my muscle memory, and the pressure of my fingertips. Unswerving. The evidence always points to a clear and obvious end. It’s only a matter of recognizing its pattern.

Tchaikovsky (of course): Souvenir d’un Lieu Cher. Gaudy, maudlin, most definitely (at the very least) bordering on trite. John doesn’t seem to mind. (John never minds.) Forced, by all these hours playing Tchaikovsky for John, to acknowledge the subjectivity of taste: observing his enjoyment makes me hear it differently, as he must hear it, even as the notes are exposed under my fingers in a familiar pattern. Ostentatious over-emotionalism on one hand; but also unpretentious, earnest honesty.

John sitting in his armchair, his eyes shut, his face relaxed (finally). The pain Mary caused still raw and hovering over him. (She has texted him four times. As each arrives, he glances at the name on the screen and winces. Only responds to the final one. Short message.) His hands are loose and resting on the arms of the chair. Palms down. Neat, clean fingernails. Jeans: slightly dirty from the crates (packed up and returned to the Met now; pruning saw identified, old flecks of blood still caught in its teeth. Simple). John’s chest rising and falling steadily. T-shirt visible under his shirt; buttons undone. The subtle shifting of his Adam’s apple. His right leg at an odd angle (it’s causing him pain). The reflection of the lamp in the shine of his belt buckle. (Recall: the sound of it against the floor of my bedroom. Feel of his skin, his knee on my thigh. His lips against mine.)

I remember these intimacies with startling clarity at the most inappropriate times. In taxis, while standing over corpses, in mid-conversation with Lestrade; standing in a queue at the bank. The smell of him comes back to me in an instant, and with it all my predictable physical reactions. My rapidly beating heart. A slight flush. My ill-timed tumidity. Never have I been so thoroughly distracted, and so thoroughly desperate to be so distracted. Maddening. Deep breath: concentrate on the music. My infallible muscle memory. The remains of takeaway (Chinese) on the table. John sighs, shifts slightly in his chair. Add a flourish to a phrase and he smiles. His face: that smile is for me, it makes my eyelids heavy with pleasure. He likes to hear me play.

Nearing the end. Turn to the window, as if I’ve been staring at the empty space above the street rather than at him. Last note: let it ring until it fades to nothing. Stand with my violin still against my jaw, fingers loose on its neck, lightly stroking the strings. Strangely nervous (why?).The stick of my bow against the seam of my trousers. Silence. John’s breathing. My rapid heartbeat in my ears.

Can hear him prepare to speak; small shift in his seat, fingernails drag against the upholstery, his lips part. “Lovely. Beautiful.” I enjoy John’s compliments. Burst of warmth in my chest.

The shuffle of his feet; he’s leaning forward. Small hesitation. “Did you...” John is always starting sentences he doesn’t finish. “When you’ve dated someone...been with someone, did you play for them?” A pause. “Of course you must have.” He leans back in the armchair again (the slight squeak of the legs shifting against the carpet).

At first it sounds like something that required a yes or no answer, which would be mildly awkward to provide, given that sentence construction, but the you must have appears to make it a rhetorical question. Don’t believe it requires an answer. Odd that he’s asking such things; thought I’d been most clear that dating (or sleeping with someone, since that’s clearly what he’s asking) is not my area. The evidence of that is relatively plain.