The Doctor And The Detective (Johnlock)

Three

Sherlock woke with his face buried in course material. He yawned and rolled over, shrieking slightly as he fell off the couch and landed with a dull thump on the ground. Almost immediately a worried looking John raced into the room. "Sherlock! Are you okay?" He stopped when he saw Sherlock lifting himself from the ground. His face contorted in an effort not to laugh. Sherlock frowned. John bit his lip. "Had a good sleep?"

Sherlock stretched his arms up. "God, you make it sound like I'm a little child." He dropped his arms and brushed a hand through his hair. "What time is it? How long have you been awake?"

"I'm not sure. I only woke up a few minutes ago. Would you like some tea?"

Sherlock nodded, and plopped his butt down on the couch. John disappeared into the kitchen. Sherlock sat straight up, sucking his lips in. One.... two.... On three, there was a yell from the kitchen. "Sherlock!"

"Yes?" Sherlock answered, sounding bored. 

"Why on earth is there three severed fingers on a paper towel in the cupboard?" John called. Sherlock suppressed laughter. 

"Oh that! I wanted to see how they decomposed, and I needed a stable, dry place to do it. The cupboard was the best - the light stays the same almost all the time and it's not wet." 

There was no answer from the kitchen, but the bang of a cupboard door told Sherlock his flatmate had taken the teabags and left the fingers. Sherlock was secretly relieved John had found the fingers - he'd forgotten about them. God, if John had never found them they could have been in there for months. Sherlock hated to think what John would say then.

John came in, carefully carrying two steaming mugs of tea. Sherlock accepted one. 

"Thanks." He copied John in blowing the steam from the top. The lazy white waft was snatched aside at Sherlock's warm exhale. They sat in silence, until John sighed, the whoosh of air seeming very loud in the quiet flat.

"Ever think that this could be just... just a dream?" John looked over to Sherlock. "Like all of this world, the people we meet, the conversations we have, the actions we take could just be consciousness feigned by a sleeping mind? And when we die it's actually not death at all. It's just us waking up. But no one knows that because no one can talk to the so-called dead. And our whole lives are just dreams that will fade into blackness when we open our eyes and start to breath again, breath properly this time."

Sherlock frowned. "Very poetic." He set his cup on the ground. "I suppose so. Interesting thought." He bit his lip thoughtfully. John blushed and looked down. 

"I... didn't mean to say that aloud. I don't know where that came from, sorry." 

Sherlock made a small sound in the back of his throat. He leaned back into the chair and steepled his fingers under his chin, resuming the infamous 'mind palace pose'. John figured he wouldn't be hearing from the detective for quite some time. He finished his tea and took the empty cup back to the kitchen, pausing to lean his head against the cool counter top.

He went back to where Sherlock was sitting, and switched the TV on, muting the sound. Sometimes John liked to try and work out what the people on the television were saying just by reading their lips, getting context from around them. He'd known quite a few deaf people, and still did. He was in awe of how they managed to see what someone was saying from the shapes their lips made. 

"You know," Sherlock said suddenly, making John jump a little. He hadn't been expecting his companion to speak for a few hours at least. Sherlock kept his eyes closed and his fingers steepled under his chin. "You know, I don't want to believe that." He opened his eyes and looked over to John. "I'd like to think that the stuff I've accomplished in my life, where I'm at now, is real. It'd be pretty disappointing if I woke up and realised me being the world's only consulting detective was just a dream."

John was momentarily captured by Sherlock's gleaming eyes. He couldn't decide whether they were green or grey. He made himself tear his attention from Sherlock's eyes, his own lingering on the sparkling orbs for a mere millisecond. "Yeah," he replied. "Yeah, I guess."