Chapter Text
A breeze beginning to grow sharp, blowing the scent of hot stone and cut grass and the ever-present rumble of traffic; a London summer evening creeps through the open window, and Sherlock Holmes lies on his back on John Watson’s bed, eyes half closed and mouth open as the good doctor kisses the soft skin beneath his jaw and unbuttons his shirt. John is gentle and unhurried; they have all night, after all.
Nights like this are the closest Sherlock gets to peace. With the window open and John’s weight pressing on his hips he can catalogue his sensations and escape, for once, out of the turning, coruscating knot of his restless mind, and drift into his body. Sherlock inhales (static in the air – there is thunder on the way; the smell of egg white and sugar, heating - Mrs Hudson is making meringues; John is beginning to sweat and it must be excitement rather than heat as the night is turning cold and yet his fingers over Sherlock’s chest are hot and if Sherlock was to run his hand down John’s back it would come away damp), and there is a catch in his breath as he breathes out – John has placed a dry-lipped kiss in the hollow of his throat. He lifts one hand (and it is difficult – his body is relaxing into the bed, each limb heavy) and threads it through John’s hair. John does not stop, but he makes a noise, deep and low, too quiet to be heard but Sherlock can feel it through his lips and it sends a shiver across his skin (already sensitive, his bared chest goose-pimpled from the cooling evening air; the skin of his thighs acutely aware of the seam of John’s jeans pressing through the fabric of his trousers and the friction they generate each time one of them shifts, friction amplified by the swellings at both of their groins).
John and Sherlock have been doing this all summer; spending long, languid nights together under John’s open window. It only ever happens in the evenings, only ever in the twilight. Sherlock wonders briefly if the timing has any significance for John; the evening has traditionally been a between-time, a liminal period where things are undefined and not all they seem. And maybe that’s what this is. Sherlock doesn’t have a name for it – these things are not his area, after all – but perhaps there isn’t one. Lovers? No. Boyfriends? Certainly not. They are just John and Sherlock and the city and it is a rare hot summer night edged with thunder, and Sherlock is beginning to slip away. John has now kissed his way down Sherlock’s abdomen and his teeth are nibbling at his navel as his hands carefully, slowly undo the buckle of Sherlock’s belt and the buttons on his trousers. As his hands delicately divest him of his boxers, Sherlock can feel connections and inferences shattering in his head, leaving him with a catalogue of sheer sensation (pulse elevated, breathing shallow, skin slick with sweat and flushing – ah). John’s mouth is around him now, one hand moving in slow lazy circles on his thigh, the other wrapped around the base of his cock and moving just as gently, just as slowly. Every twitch of John’s hand is electric and every swirl of his tongue traces fire; Sherlock is so sensitive now he is sure he can feel every crease of John’s lips and every ridge on his fingers; it seems every nerve is singing with arousal and if he doesn’t move now, he will die.
“John,” he croaks, his voice hoarser and breathier than he intended. He looks up, and there is a sly half-smile on his lips and approaching lightning reflecting in his eyes, so Sherlock pulls him up and kisses him, his lips forceful, his fingers cupping John’s chin. It is a strange sensation, Sherlock thinks with the small part of himself still capable of thinking, strange to feel his animal instincts can override that great mind of his. After all, hasn’t he trained himself to be rational, to ignore the sentiment and sensuality of almost everyone else? And yet here he is, tongue tracing the palate of John Watson’s mouth because it is what he must do, right now. He shouldn’t want this, shouldn’t need this in the way he does, but the small dissenting part of him is getting weaker and fainter, like a radio tuned slightly off-signal, and the majority of Sherlock’s mind is thinking that although the sensation of John’s t-shirt against his bare chest is delicious, the fact that John is still fully dressed is unacceptable and that fact needs to be altered right away.
Sherlock almost rips John’s shirt from his body, pulling the damp cotton over John’s head, and if he had any space in his mind to reflect, he would note how odd it was that once his mind shut down, his body came alive. A quick bit of teamwork has John’s jeans and boxers on the floor, and then John is on top of him again, kissing his neck only this time it’s hard and possessive and as John bites down on his shoulder Sherlock moans.
“John,” he stutters, and it’s all he seems capable of saying. The storm outside has broken and the rain spatters against the window pane, bouncing in through the opening, and Sherlock aches with a need he can barely vocalise because the city and John have overwhelmed his senses and the pleasure singing through his body like a violin solo has stolen his words.
“Now, Sherlock?” asks John, breath hot against his ear.
“Please,” he gasps, gripping John’s shoulder, and something in his voice makes the doctor pull away, looking down at him with concern.
“Easy, Sherlock,” says John, after a minute. “This is supposed to be relaxing, remember?”
“John, please,” he replies, and he means the tone to be frustrated and irritable but even he can hear the desperation in it.
Whatever John hears, it’s enough, as he bends his head to Sherlock’s and places a kiss on his cheek, just beneath the right eye, and as he pulls away towards the bedside table, Sherlock can feel the kissed skin burn. John is out of contact with him for only a few seconds, but those few seconds stretch to an eternity, and the hammering of Sherlock’s heart sounds louder than the thunder. And then John is back, and Sherlock tilts up his hips, arms reaching out to John, wanting to pull him close, pull him inside. But John is moving slowly, and fingers slick with lube are running the length of Sherlock’s perineum, before flicking across his quivering hole. Every twitch of John’s fingers gets and answering twitch from Sherlock, and then suddenly John’s fingers are taken away. The whine of protestation has barely left Sherlock’s throat before he hears the sounds of a condom being applied, and now Sherlock is arching his back in anticipation and then John is inside of him.
“Is that all right?” asks John, and Sherlock can’t find the words to tell him just how all right it is, so he nods, and John begins to thrust. His rhythm is slow and firm, pushing all the way into Sherlock again and again. Somewhere in Sherlock’s wracked mind he is glad of the slowness, of the gentleness, because even though his ecstasy is at such a pitch it’s almost agony, this beautiful, wonderful moment is being prolonged. He can smell John’s cologne, taste the sweat slicked on his skin, hear his breathy moans and where his fingers dig into John’s back he can feel the knots in the muscles of his wounded shoulder, the way John cradles his head and traces the outline of his ear, soft and sweet as though Sherlock is something precious; Sherlock wants to feel everything, experience and index each point of data about John, build a world from them and stay in it. He can hear his own voice pleading, and in response John takes Sherlock’s cock in his hand, stroking it swiftly, pumping his hand up and down the shaft. The burst of pleasure is intense, and while Sherlock’s back arches and a cry bursts from his lips he wonders how to tell John that what he really wants is this moment, drawn out forever, when there is nothing but the open window and the bedsheets and them.
As thunder echoes around Baker Street, Sherlock comes.
It takes a minute or two for Sherlock’s mind to come back to him, but when it does, John is handing him a wet cloth to wipe himself down with. There is a puddle beneath the window, and John is grumbling as he negotiates closing the window without getting his feet wet. Sherlock flops onto his side of the bed (closest the door, as he never stays the night – he waits until John has fallen asleep, and then leaves. It’s easier that way – their activities do not infringe on their daytime lives) and lies back, his mind still pleasantly fuzzy from all the endorphins. John eventually gets the window shut, and pads back to the bed, settling himself close to Sherlock, but not touching him. Suddenly, and unexpectedly, John lifts himself on his elbow and looks straight at Sherlock, his face soft and expression unfamiliar in the lamplight. Sherlock frowns, but John runs one tender finger down the lines of his cheekbone before sagging back and turning off the bedside lamp. John’s breathing deepens, and he is asleep in less than six minutes (quicker than average) and all is silent but the rain. However, behind his closed eyes Sherlock’s mind is racing again, adding together all the slight details, hurtling towards the inevitable conclusion (the delicate way John held him, the look in his eyes, the exquisitely gentle fucking, the final glance and gentle touch…oh).
Sherlock’s eyes open wide in the darkness.
John loves me, thinks Sherlock, and after this conclusion is reached there is a beat of perfect silence in his head.
In the next moment he is suddenly fighting a sickening wave of fear. He presses his hands together (slight tremble, in time with the flutter of his stomach) and inhales deeply. After another few cleansing breaths, the physical symptoms are fading and he can feel his mind in ascendancy again. A few more breaths and he will be ready to analyse those symptoms; right now they are a mystery and Sherlock cannot stand unsolved mysteries. He reaches for similar instances in his mind, searching for correlations. He felt like this on Dartmoor, he remembers. (Cause? A giant befanged hellhound. His reaction was appropriate). But the Baskerville case involved hallucinogens and therefore his normal responses were skewed. When else has he felt like this?
“I was so alone, and I owe you so much.” The words float to the surface of Sherlock’s mind and even after all this time he grimaces at the pain of them. He had cursed himself over and over for installing that microphone; he’d berated himself for listening to the recordings; he’d wished with all his being that he could have heard the words when John had said them. Had he done so, he would have run to John, then and there. But that had been impossible. By the time he had discovered what John Watson had to say to his headstone, Sherlock was in the cargo hold of a flight headed to Dubrovnik. For a long, terrible moment, (One more miracle, Sherlock, for me) he had sprung to his feet, scrambling out of the baggage cart that had been his hiding place, and cast about desperately for something to use as a parachute, not caring that he was thirty-thousand feet above the Adriatic sea and there was no way out of a pressurized hold that wouldn’t involve a speedy death. It took Sherlock’s vision blurring completely and his breathing becoming laboured for him to finally crawl back into baggage cart and let out one wracking sob. Something had broken open in Sherlock, and he sobbed as he hadn’t since he was almost too young to remember. His breath was raw in his throat, and his chest convulsed until he was sure he had no breath left. He may have moaned John’s name, but he’s unsure now of whether he did. The tears had stopped quickly, but in their place they left an awful awareness, a water-mark Sherlock has been unable to delete in all the time since. By the time he was on the ground again, he was calmer, set again in his determination to destroy Moriarty’s web and clear his name before he returned, but the knowledge of John’s pain pulled at him like North to a compass needle, in the background, ever present.
He had been so afraid then, curled up and weeping in the baggage cart. It was fear of what he’d inflicted on John, and Sherlock turns his head to see the dim outline of John’s face, angled slightly away, and wonders if this is the same thing. John loves him, and Sherlock cannot love John. And if ever John speaks his love in a way Sherlock can’t ignore, Sherlock must tell him so, and then John would hurt. Something icy squeezes Sherlock’s chest. He doesn’t want to hurt John again. Not that badly.
(Worst case scenario? John tells his love. Sherlock rejects it. John is hurt. John is sentimental, and cannot bear being around Sherlock, who reminds him of his pain. John leaves Baker Street.)
Suddenly the rush of fear is back and it’s worse. John can’t leave. John is remarkable, extraordinary, one of a kind and if he walked away Sherlock could never find a replacement. The fear is threatening to turn into blind panic. But emotion is a stain on his pure reason and caring is not an advantage and Sherlock has never loved anyone before and now John loves him and he has no idea what to do.
This isn’t an objection to John, Sherlock clarifies to himself. John is Good. He’s kind, brave, fierce and loyal. He is intelligent (not on Sherlock’s level but thinking of any kind is good, and John’s brain works admirably fast compared to the rest of his acquaintance); he’s patient (no one has stayed with Sherlock for this long, not ever); the frailty of genius may be that it needs an audience, but Sherlock needs only John, these days. If John is with him, everything becomes a little better.
Sherlock’s second deduction of the night crashes unexpectedly into his mind.
Oh hell, he thinks.