The Progress of Sherlock Holmes

Pattern Recognition

“It’s...” he begins again, and just when I think he won’t finish this sentence either, he does. “It’s very seductive, you know. It would be...quite effective.”

“Hm.” It’s a non-committal response. Am inordinately pleased that he finds my playing seductive. Is he remembering the same intimacies I am? (My hands on the back of his neck, in his hair, creeping down his back?) Is he longing for them? Makes me want to play him something else. I raise my bow.

“So did you? Or...do you?” Not a rhetorical question, then. I turn and look at him. His eyes are open, hungry, he’s tensed a bit. Bad leg forgotten (for the moment). His breath has sped up slightly too (just like mine). Arousal. I cock an eyebrow. John is asking one question but meaning another altogether. These are not the kinds of word games at which I excel. What does he mean? Am I sleeping with someone else now? As he has Mary, do I have someone too? Do I play for someone else as he sits in Clapton watching X-Factor with Mary?

“Did you play like that for your...your ex-...” a pause. “Your....” he reaches for a word and fails to find one. I know what he’s cycling through:girlfriends, boyfriends, not sure which to use. Surely he must know by now that I have a preference. Can’t imagine me with either men or women, struggling to pronounce the words at all? Or he can, he can imagine me with both and cannot choose between them? Not wanting to be offensive, to make assumptions. (Making erroneous assumptions: it’s what we do best.) Finally he settles on: “Did you play for your...former lovers?” Gender neutral. A strike for political correctness. Bravo, John.

I swing the bow up and hover it over the strings again. Haven’t decided what to play. My fingers: not placed, no contingency. Pause. Still an awkward sentence to answer directly. Must clarify. (Is that what he wants to know? Surely I’ve been clear on this point as well.)

“Don’t have any.”

Tchaikovsky again? Or something else? Tchaikovsky will always please him, will always be seductive.

“No former ones?” A short laugh. “Are you still sleeping with them, then?”

What an odd presumption. John really observes nothing about me at all if he imagines that’s true. Perhaps that is the sub-conversation here: is John feeling jealous of people who do not exist? “No. I haven’t had any lovers.” Concerto in D? Is one Tchaikovsky piece as good as the next for John? Place fingers; prepared.

“What?” Genuine surprise. “None at...” Another sentence he won’t finish. None at all. That’s right John. I suppose that’s odd. Unexpected. I don’t really care. “Oh.” He exhales. “I.” Possibly the shortest sentence ever uttered. A lengthy pause. I stroke my violin strings, wait for him to make sense of it.

What does it mean that he didn’t know this about me? Nothing. It means nothing. There is no before and after consciousness, sex isn’t the making of a man. There is no secret knowledge that is unlocked, surely. It makes no difference, except for the difference it appears to make to John. There is a palpable tension rising between us which I cannot strictly define. Don’t want to be standing by the window, violin tucked under my chin. Want to be in my bed, with John beside me, his hands on me, his mouth against mine. Uncertain how to move from here to there. No direct path. No map. I turn further so I can see him, see his face. Take the violin out from under my chin. Wait. Watch.

“I thought that...” John sighs. He looks nervous. Strangely nervous. Is it nervous? Something else?

Apparently this is a more significant revelation than I realized. Why? Another category for John to add to his list of areas where my knowledge is clearly lacking? Has everything changed meaning (again)?

He rubs his index finger against his lip. “Well, at first, you know, I did sort of wonder about that. You did say it wasn’t your area. I remember that. I mean, I figured...maybe you weren’t currently interested in...well, a relationship. A difficult break up, or something. Later I wondered if maybe you, uh...you didn’t have...”