I was not expecting it.
It didn't make much sense.
Until it suddenly did.
Of course it did.
It was where it all began, after all.
Where we began.
Driving down the streets of this fair city at breakneck speed in quest of a suicide and a serial killer.
With the jet sky violated by the flashing lights of London.
With adrenaline racing through my veins for the first time since I'd been forced to forsake the war I so sorely missed.
With a man I'd known for less than 24 hours who'd already managed to amaze me more than anyone had in my whole life of bottles and bullets, guns and girls.
My whole life that he'd just absorbed into himself in seconds, reading the memories of war and wound as if they'd been carved into my skin.
And he wasn't running yet.
That was the miraculous part.
He'd discovered the drink and dispute I had fled from and wasnt disgusted himself.
And it was brilliant. Amazing.
Because usually when people found out, they'd tell me to piss off.
But he was still here.
And he was smiling.
And you could tell he didn't do it often.
Only people who didn't smile often smiled like they were bathing in the happiness of the world when they did.
That's what he smiled like.
It almost made me believe there could be happiness in the world. Somewhere. Perhaps with him.
With Sherlock Holmes.
But not without.
That was for sure.
Not when I climbed into the back seat of a black London cab that felt so empty without his imperious, eager presence.
Not when I realised that it was not only the cab that felt empty, but my now-hollow self that craved his cynicism just as much as his ecstasy.
Not when I was forced to clamber out not more than a minute later and apologize to the cabbie who, as always, wore the face of the man I had killed for Sherlock Holmes.
I was not expecting to feel such aversion towards the vehicles that I'd roamed the streets of London in all my life.
Then I remembered that my life had only truly begun when I met Sherlock Holmes, and that it was him that I'd roamed the streets with.
And now that he was gone, I could no longer roam. Instead I was confined to prowling the Underground.
