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It started at the crime scene. Luckily, they’d processed the body and the forensics team were almost finished clearing it up so there was no evidence destroyed. But it so happened that on this occasion, Lestrade had been lucky enough to convince Sherlock to stick around and give an official statement of process to an awaiting PC. Sherlock was mid-rant when the rain started.
“Ah, they said that would happen today,” John said folding his arms around his torso, “Knew I should have brought a coat.”
They’d left so quickly John hadn’t had time. The sideways glare he gave Sherlock now was enough to make the young constable shuffle his feet nervously.
“We’ll get home before it gets too bad,” Sherlock reassured John, turning back to the police officer in front of him, “Tell Lestrade I’ll be in tomorrow with the rest.”
They were off the industrial estate and walking down the main road in search of a taxi in no time. However, bad weather and late hour had the habit of making all pedestrians want to invest in their commute home from drinking establishments, so the amount of taxis with lights on signalling availability were few and far between. So far, they hadn’t found one.
John was soaked through. His woollen jumper having taken on so much water it draped heavily on his shoulders and hung in an unnatural curve over his chest.
“Fucking rain,” John swore, which only went to show how irritated he was. John swore a lot by nature, his time in the army and on the rugby field saw to that, but it was usually kept to the lesser end of the offensive scale. Soaked through, with tired feet and hair slicked to his forehead, John was pulling out the big guns.
His shoulder was aching too. It felt stiff and creaky as the rain began to lash down and the wind picked up. He was chilled, shivering slightly as Sherlock flung an arm into the road, finally catching the attention of a passing taxi.
As the vehicle came to a stop next to them, John felt a heavy weight encloak him. The press of warm, comforting wool settled around him, fluttering like a cape and nestling against him. He watched as Sherlock, now bereft of coat, stepped into the taxi.
John shifted his arms through the awaiting sleeves, draping the wool around himself and feeling instantly warmer than he had.
“Thank you,” he said, following Sherlock into the taxi.
As he slumped down in the seat, the relief of being out of the rain was beautiful. The collar of the coat flopped over, still water logged but not soaked through all the way to the lining. The scent of Sherlock’s cologne hit his nose and John found himself shifting so the material was laid across the bottom half of his face. He inhaled deeply, trying to keep it less than obvious what he was up to. There was the smell of rain and rising humidity as the windows of the taxi steamed up, but his nose was filled with Sherlock and it seemed to calm his irritation.
As they pulled up to Baker Street the thunder finally rumbled in the distance. A crack of lightning lit up the sky as they were going through the door and Sherlock twitched slightly, as though startled.
“You alright?” John asked, sliding the coat from his shoulders with an appreciative smile but the lingering sense of reluctance curving in his gut.
“Perfectly fine, John.” Sherlock said in that dismissive way he had. How someone could turn his name into punctuation, John didn’t know, but when Sherlock said it like that it clearly indicated the end of a discussion.
“Right.” John said, not pushing it. “I’m going to shower and then get in to bed. I don’t know why these murderers have to drag us out of bed.”
“Even a complete moron would see that murder in the cold light of day was a mistake.” Sherlock said ruefully.
Thunder cracked again, sounding as if it were wrapped around the entire house. Sherlock frowned and uncharacteristically chewed on a thumbnail.
“You sure you’re okay?”
He shouldn’t have pushed it, he should have disappeared up the stairs and left Sherlock to whatever annoying experiment he was going to take up in the absence of a case to solve. But the lanky detective was thrumming with something suppressed. His was shifting his feet, flexing his fingers and chewing his lip.
“I said I was fine!” Sherlock erupted, “Do take your caretaker sensibilities and project them on to someone else. Some of us are perfectly adequate without your ridiculous hovering.”
John let out a sigh as Sherlock stomped up the stairs and he heard the faint sound of his bedroom door slamming. Whatever it was that was troubling Sherlock, clearly it wasn’t enough to mellow him, so John didn’t consider it threatening enough to pursue him. Instead, he treated himself to a hot shower, longer than he would usually allow himself, until he felt the heat sink right into his bones.
Finally warm, he slipped into his pyjamas and hunkered down in his duvet, finally glad of a chance to catch up on sleep.
It wasn’t much later, an hour top, when John had finally found a comfortable spot that didn’t pull at his aching shoulder, that the faint tapping started on his door. Thunder sounded and lightning ripped across the sky through John’s curtains. The knocking increased.
“Come in Sherlock,” John sighed.
The door swung open slowly and a pyjama clad Sherlock slunk in. He was trying to remain nonchalant but failing as another belt of thunder filled the room with sound.
“I, um.”
John was mostly asleep. At least, that’s the excuse he’d use later. Too tired to really comprehend what he was doing, so when he pulled the duvet back to allow Sherlock to slip in beside him, it was because he hadn’t really thought through the implications.
“Thunderstorms, really?” He muttered into his pillow as Sherlock’s warm weight made the bed dip behind him.
There was a huff of breath, a long suffering sigh. “It is illogical,” Sherlock allowed.
“So is the fact that I don’t like the beach.”
“The sand.”
“Yes,” John confirmed, though Sherlock hadn’t really been asking a question, more voicing his deductions out loud as he was wont to do. “Seen too many deserts and too many body parts in the dunes. Makes for an unsettling seaside experience.”
For once, Sherlock did not have a sardonic quip in response.
“We all have our illogicalities, Sherlock.”
“You have many.”
John laughed, shoulder shaking so that they brushed against Sherlock’s lithe body laying next to him, barely inches apart.
“I’ll give you that. One big walking contradiction me.”
“You were trained to heal, yet you went to war. You can both stitch skin together and shoot through it with the utmost precision. Your contractions are vast, but I wouldn’t change any of them.”
John swallowed, thankful for the dark of his room. There was a moment silence that hung thick and heavy over them, filling the tiniest of space between their skin and asking for the promise of unvoiced words.
There was a crack of thunder to break the silence. Followed quickly by a flash of lightning. The storm must be close now, passing over the top of them and moving off to places unknown. John thought of all the other times he’d laid under a tumultuous sky, back then he had wished he was somewhere else. He thought of all the storms he’d weathered, both actual and metaphorical. If he hadn’t been the cause, Sherlock had always been the cure, he’d been putting John back together piece by piece for as long as he could remember.
A final rumble of thunder echoed in the room and Sherlock’s hand reached out quickly and locked with his own. John was alarmed, but he didn’t pull away.
Sherlock seemed to heave a sigh of relief at the contact and shifted to find a more comfortable position.
“Thank you,” he said softly, thumb swiping once over John’s knuckles.
“Good night Sherlock,” John said.
“Goodnight.”
There were storms and deserts, bad memories and good ones, but for the moment they were outside of this room. John closed his eyes in the dark, listened to the rain lash against the window and to the steady breathing at his nape and knew that tomorrow, once the storm had passed, the skies would be full of promise.