The Bang and the Clatter (23/36)
Jul. 25th, 2013 11:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
earlgreytea68Title - The Bang and the Clatter (23/36)
Author -![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
earlgreytea68
Rating - Teen
Characters - John, Sherlock
Spoilers - Through "The Reichenbach Fall"
Disclaimer - I don't own them and I don't make money off of them, but I don't like to dwell on that, so let's move on.
Summary - Sherlock Holmes is a pitcher and John Watson is a catcher. No, no, no, it's a baseball AU.
Author's Notes - Many, many thanks to arctacuda, for helping with the writing and for uncomplainingly beta-ing when I whine.
Chapter One - Chapter Two - Chapter Three - Chapter Four - Chapter Five - Chapter Six - Chapter Seven - Chapter Eight - Chapter Nine - Chapter Ten - Chapter Eleven - Chapter Twelve - Chapter Thirteen - Chapter Fourteen - Chapter Fifteen - Chapter Sixteen - Chapter Seventeen - Chapter Eighteen - Chapter Nineteen - Chapter Twenty - Chapter Twenty-One - Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Warming up in the bullpen, said Fenway’s PA system, starting catcher for the National League, John Watson, and starting pitcher for the National League, Sherlock Holmes.
John heard the introduction vaguely, waved vaguely to the television crowd he knew must be watching him. If Sherlock heard it he gave no indication, drifting into his wind-up with a slight jerk that John knew was purposeful because he was hoping the AL was paying attention in the other bullpen and reporting that Holmes looked less smooth than usual. Sherlock played more head games while pitching than anyone John had ever met. John loved him for all of them. And he was also pleased that he now knew the difference between Sherlock faking something wrong and Sherlock actually having something wrong. Although he needed to react the same way to each or the deception wouldn’t work.
Sherlock caught the ball and didn’t pitch it back, fiddling with the baseball cap he hated and walking over to where John stood to meet him.
“Here’s where I express concern over the jerk you’ve developed at the end of your motion.”
“Terrible, isn’t it?” responded Sherlock, blandly.
“Are you ready?”
Sherlock didn’t even bother to respond. John knew he considered it a stupid question. “Are you?”
John took a deep breath and shook out his bad leg, flexed his bad hand, even though neither one of them ever bothered him anymore. Old habits. “Yes.”
“John.” Sherlock paused with his hand on the door to Fenway’s bullpen, blocking John’s path out onto the field.
John looked at him quizzically.
“This is your All-Star Game. I wanted you to remember that. You are here, at Fenway Park, which I know is the stadium of every single one of your childhood dreams about baseball, and you’re starting the All-Star Game for the National League. I just wanted to remind you of that.”
John stared at him for a moment. And then he grinned. “Look at you.”
Sherlock looked a bit uncomfortable. “What? Look at me what?”
“Being all sentimental about baseball,” John teased.
“You’re the one who’s sentimental about baseball.”
“And you’re encouraging it.”
“Because I don’t want you to forget, with everything else that’s going on, how much you wanted this.”
John regarded him for a moment and thought it was probably one of those moments when he was being a terrible actor, but he couldn’t help it, he couldn’t imagine loving him any more than he did right at that moment. Here in this moment, here in this place, John Watson, he thought to himself, you have everything you could ever have imagined wanting. “Let’s go win a game at Fenway,” he said.
Sherlock winked at him and then pushed the bullpen door open, and they walked across the outfield together, with cameras flashing all around them.
“Let’s let them hit me tonight,” Sherlock said. “I’ve always wanted to play with a decent shortstop behind me.”
“Where would be the challenge in that, Sherlock?” John asked, as they walked into the dugout.
“Good?” Esteban Diaz asked, coming over to them.
“Good,” John answered, because he knew Sherlock wouldn’t.
Sherlock surprised him, though. Instead of sitting and keeping entirely to himself in his own little world, the way he usually did, Sherlock leaned against the railing at the front of the dugout and watched every single pitch that was being thrown with a voracious curiosity.
John knew by now what that look on Sherlock’s face meant and didn’t bother him, but he did wonder what was up with the uncharacteristic behavior.
Sherlock had an absolutely blazing four-pitch first inning, helped by every single batter swinging at the first pitch.
“Idiots,” Sherlock said, as he met John at the opening of the dugout. “Where do they get their scouting reports?”
“They don’t want to give you time to out-think them off-balance. They’re figuring their best shot is the first pitch you throw, before you’ve gotten too much into their heads.”
“It’s a stupid approach. I throw good first pitches. They’d be better off getting me irritated by drawing the at-bats out; I’d be more likely to lose my patience then.”
John looked at the National League players all around them. “And you’ve just given all of our competitors the world’s best scouting report on you,” he remarked, dryly, which provoked laughter from the rest of the dugout and some scattered applause.
Sherlock shrugged, unconcerned, and John knew he just considered it more of a challenge. He went back to leaning up against the dugout fence, watching closely again. John leaned next to him, silent, watching the back-and-forth of the baseball game. This is your All-Star Game, he thought. Pay attention to this.
They had a good inning. After two quick outs, they wrangled a hit and then a walk.
“That’s me on deck,” John remarked, pushing back from the fence.
“John.” Sherlock didn’t move and never took his eyes off the field, but he spoke quickly and firmly. “He’s shaken. He didn’t expect that to be a walk. He doesn’t feel he’s getting the outside corner call, and he’s panicking about it, so he’s going to be heavily inside to you the entire at-bat. You have a reputation for being a poor slider hitter, but that’s an undeserved reputation. You can hit a slider. And I’m telling you that you’re going to see one, first pitch, slider on the inside corner. Don’t let him back you off the plate. Turn on it and push it out. It’s actually an ideal pitch for you.”
John stared at him in surprise.
“Watson!” somebody barked from behind him.
“Yeah,” John said, dazedly. “I’m coming. Sherlock—”
“Hurry up,” Sherlock snapped, impatiently. “I’m right, go out there and prove it.”
John had a sudden flash that he didn’t want to be the thing that proved Sherlock wrong. Not in this instance. Maybe some other time he would relish winning a fight against him. Just now, he stood at the plate in Fenway Park. He had the bases loaded, the result of a beautifully executed bunt by the hitter ahead of him that he beat to first. The pitcher was clearly rattled. The catcher had jogged out to him, and they were having a consultation. They were not from the same team, the AL starting battery, and John knew that made the conference awkward and stilted and not terribly helpful.
John stood by the plate, waiting, thinking, Sherlock thinks it’s going to be a slider, inside corner. Sherlock thinks you can hit a slider. When is Sherlock ever wrong? He’s right that all you need to do is push it. It doesn’t even need to find a hole out there. You can just hit a sacrifice fly. Nobody would think less of you for that. You’d have an RBI in the All-Star Game. John glanced toward the first-base coach, who did nothing but clap twice to indicate that it was John’s at-bat to do as he wished. It was early in the game, Sherlock had been so incredibly dazzling in his first inning, and the American League pitcher was so clearly rattled. The National League was relaxed. It was not a time for strategy. John glanced toward Sherlock, who was steadily watching the AL pitcher and not John.
The umpire went out to break up the conference. The catcher jogged back, looking a bit harried.
John settled into his batting stance. Slider, inside corner, he thought. It’s going to be a slider, inside corner. Don’t think yourself out of it, just swing the bat and push the ball—He hit it in exactly the perfect spot, with exactly the right force. He felt it immediately. In fact, it was so perfect that he couldn’t even begin to think about moving. He wanted to stand there by home plate, finishing up his swing, relishing the perfect vibration of the bat in his hand.
The catcher stood up next to him, pushing his helmet off his head. John was dimly aware of this, as he stood there watching his ball sail into the first row of seats. What the hell, he thought, in disbelief. Did I just hit a grand slam in Fenway Park during the All-Star Game? He looked at the umpire, who was making the signal for home run, and he forced himself to move, to start his trot around the bases. Do. Not. Faint, he told himself, firmly, and kept one foot in front of the other. First base, then second, then third, and the crowd was roaring in his ears, and he was doing a home run trot at Fenway Park in the All-Star Game. The three players who’d been on base were waiting for him at home plate, and they leaped atop him as he got there, and he laughed because he couldn’t help it. The dugout met him, throwing out ecstatic congratulations, and John felt giddy and delighted.
Sherlock was still leaning against the dugout fence, still watching the flustered AL pitcher. “Well done,” he said, mildly, without looking at John, but he didn’t fool John for a minute.
“Smug,” said John.
Sherlock said nothing, but John could see the amusement lurking in his eyes.
“If you can do that all the time, why don’t you?”
“Because I can’t. Tonight is your lucky night, John Watson.” Sherlock straightened from the dugout fence. “And that’s the third out. Let’s go.”
John, feeling like he was walking on air, took up his position behind home plate and did some lazy warming-up with Sherlock, who had been sitting in the dugout for a while and had only thrown four pitches all game. It showed, too, because Sherlock’s first pitch was an uncharacteristic mistake, hit sharply into the hole between second and first. The runner ended up on first, and Sherlock seemed inordinately concerned about him, throwing over twice to cut his lead, which he almost never did. Sherlock normally ignored any runners he allowed.
John called for a time-out and jogged out to the mound. Sherlock waited, frowning at the runner on first as if he’d personally offended him.
“Okay,” John said, holding his glove to his mouth so no one could read his lips. “Shake that off. Who cares about the runner? You’re letting yourself get distracted.”
“Am I?” asked Sherlock, not bothering to hide his own lips.
“Yes,” John replied. “Let’s get a double play right now; he’ll be gone.”
Sherlock nodded once, shortly, and John retreated back to home.
And Sherlock threw back over to first, apparently concerned that the runner might possibly be thinking about stealing second. Bloody stubborn git, John thought, frowning furiously, and finally Sherlock threw a pitch, a fairly bad one, far outside, and the runner at first took off for second, and John came up flinging the ball toward second.
“Out!” the umpire roared, from the tangle of limbs that was second base.
Sherlock looked at him from the pitcher’s mound and, unusually, grinned. John blinked at him in shock and then realized exactly what had happened there.
When the inning was over, John waited for him at the dugout steps and hissed, “You let that runner get on base specifically so I could throw him out.”
“Of course I did,” Sherlock replied, unconcerned. “Did you think that was an accident?”
John shook his head, thinking it was hopeless and Sherlock was fantastic and he wanted to shove him up against the wall and have his way with him, many different ways with him. John was certain that would be allowed once the game was over, which pretty much made what was already shaping up to be the best day of his life inconceivably better.
The score was still 4-0 as they trotted out for the bottom of the fourth. Well, John was trotting out. Sherlock had paused and was speaking to Esteban in rapid-fire Spanish.
“What was that about?” John asked when Sherlock joined him on the dugout steps on the way to the field.
“Nothing.”
“You don’t even talk to our own manager during a game, never mind a strange manager. And you speak Spanish?”
Sherlock gave him his don’t ask stupid questions look and walked out to the pitcher’s mound.
Sherlock dispensed with the first two batters with the efficiency he’d displayed all game, aside from his deliberate mistake with the runner in the second, which, honestly, had thrown off the AL so much that it might as well have been strategy. And, for all John knew, it had been strategy and not just a little gift to John.
But now, with the third batter of the inning up, suddenly they couldn’t get on the same page. Sherlock shook him off and shook him off and shook him off. They hadn’t had such a huge pitching disagreement in ages. John admitted he was annoyed about it. It was the bloody All-Star Game, couldn’t Sherlock just be cooperative for once? Fine, thought John, throw whatever you want. He put his glove in a neutral position.
Sherlock stood on the mound, unmoving, and even from the distance he was at, John could tell he was frowning and unhappy. What the hell.
John called for time again and jogged out to the mound. “What’s the matter?” he demanded from behind his glove. “Are you tired? Do you need a second to breathe?”
“No.” Sherlock had lifted his glove as well, which he so seldom did that John lifted his eyebrows in response. “This is our last inning. Esteban told me before we came out here. So I want you to breathe. I want you to realize that you were voted in by the fans, and it had nothing to do with me. I know you’ve been thinking, in your head, that they just wanted me here and thought they had to ask you along to accomplish it, but it’s not true. They wanted you, and you deserve to be here, and this has been your All-Star Game, John Watson.”
The thought slammed into John, and he realized that he had managed to forget, and trust Sherlock to realize that. He turned from Sherlock, stepped back to stand beside him, and looked up, at Fenway all around them and the sky above that. The crowd noise rushed up to fill in, no longer blocked out in his head automatically by the activity of playing baseball. Cameras flashed all around them, dazzling. Sherlock stood next to him, silent, and John wondered what he was thinking. Because John’s head was a dizzying collage of childhood memories and his own career highlights, all entangled in one huge mess, and he felt drunk with the fact that the only thing he’d ever found in his life that he loved more than baseball was the man currently standing next to him. And as much as he was going to miss this game, he would miss it far less because he’d found this man.
John turned back to him. “Thank you,” he said, gravely. “For everything. All of it. Aside from all the rest of it, this has been…the biggest honor. I mean, it’s meant the world, to catch you. Forget everything else. It’s always… I don’t tell you that often enough.”
“You tell me every single time I throw a pitch at you, John. Never think I don’t know.”
John looked across at him for a second and then nodded, too overwhelmed by everything to come up with any other response. He walked back to home plate, pressing firmly into his memory, to be cherished forever, every single step he took. He felt Sherlock’s eyes watch him all the way back.
Next Chapter
Author -
earlgreytea68Rating - Teen
Characters - John, Sherlock
Spoilers - Through "The Reichenbach Fall"
Disclaimer - I don't own them and I don't make money off of them, but I don't like to dwell on that, so let's move on.
Summary - Sherlock Holmes is a pitcher and John Watson is a catcher. No, no, no, it's a baseball AU.
Author's Notes - Many, many thanks to arctacuda, for helping with the writing and for uncomplainingly beta-ing when I whine.
Chapter One - Chapter Two - Chapter Three - Chapter Four - Chapter Five - Chapter Six - Chapter Seven - Chapter Eight - Chapter Nine - Chapter Ten - Chapter Eleven - Chapter Twelve - Chapter Thirteen - Chapter Fourteen - Chapter Fifteen - Chapter Sixteen - Chapter Seventeen - Chapter Eighteen - Chapter Nineteen - Chapter Twenty - Chapter Twenty-One - Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Warming up in the bullpen, said Fenway’s PA system, starting catcher for the National League, John Watson, and starting pitcher for the National League, Sherlock Holmes.
John heard the introduction vaguely, waved vaguely to the television crowd he knew must be watching him. If Sherlock heard it he gave no indication, drifting into his wind-up with a slight jerk that John knew was purposeful because he was hoping the AL was paying attention in the other bullpen and reporting that Holmes looked less smooth than usual. Sherlock played more head games while pitching than anyone John had ever met. John loved him for all of them. And he was also pleased that he now knew the difference between Sherlock faking something wrong and Sherlock actually having something wrong. Although he needed to react the same way to each or the deception wouldn’t work.
Sherlock caught the ball and didn’t pitch it back, fiddling with the baseball cap he hated and walking over to where John stood to meet him.
“Here’s where I express concern over the jerk you’ve developed at the end of your motion.”
“Terrible, isn’t it?” responded Sherlock, blandly.
“Are you ready?”
Sherlock didn’t even bother to respond. John knew he considered it a stupid question. “Are you?”
John took a deep breath and shook out his bad leg, flexed his bad hand, even though neither one of them ever bothered him anymore. Old habits. “Yes.”
“John.” Sherlock paused with his hand on the door to Fenway’s bullpen, blocking John’s path out onto the field.
John looked at him quizzically.
“This is your All-Star Game. I wanted you to remember that. You are here, at Fenway Park, which I know is the stadium of every single one of your childhood dreams about baseball, and you’re starting the All-Star Game for the National League. I just wanted to remind you of that.”
John stared at him for a moment. And then he grinned. “Look at you.”
Sherlock looked a bit uncomfortable. “What? Look at me what?”
“Being all sentimental about baseball,” John teased.
“You’re the one who’s sentimental about baseball.”
“And you’re encouraging it.”
“Because I don’t want you to forget, with everything else that’s going on, how much you wanted this.”
John regarded him for a moment and thought it was probably one of those moments when he was being a terrible actor, but he couldn’t help it, he couldn’t imagine loving him any more than he did right at that moment. Here in this moment, here in this place, John Watson, he thought to himself, you have everything you could ever have imagined wanting. “Let’s go win a game at Fenway,” he said.
Sherlock winked at him and then pushed the bullpen door open, and they walked across the outfield together, with cameras flashing all around them.
“Let’s let them hit me tonight,” Sherlock said. “I’ve always wanted to play with a decent shortstop behind me.”
“Where would be the challenge in that, Sherlock?” John asked, as they walked into the dugout.
“Good?” Esteban Diaz asked, coming over to them.
“Good,” John answered, because he knew Sherlock wouldn’t.
Sherlock surprised him, though. Instead of sitting and keeping entirely to himself in his own little world, the way he usually did, Sherlock leaned against the railing at the front of the dugout and watched every single pitch that was being thrown with a voracious curiosity.
John knew by now what that look on Sherlock’s face meant and didn’t bother him, but he did wonder what was up with the uncharacteristic behavior.
Sherlock had an absolutely blazing four-pitch first inning, helped by every single batter swinging at the first pitch.
“Idiots,” Sherlock said, as he met John at the opening of the dugout. “Where do they get their scouting reports?”
“They don’t want to give you time to out-think them off-balance. They’re figuring their best shot is the first pitch you throw, before you’ve gotten too much into their heads.”
“It’s a stupid approach. I throw good first pitches. They’d be better off getting me irritated by drawing the at-bats out; I’d be more likely to lose my patience then.”
John looked at the National League players all around them. “And you’ve just given all of our competitors the world’s best scouting report on you,” he remarked, dryly, which provoked laughter from the rest of the dugout and some scattered applause.
Sherlock shrugged, unconcerned, and John knew he just considered it more of a challenge. He went back to leaning up against the dugout fence, watching closely again. John leaned next to him, silent, watching the back-and-forth of the baseball game. This is your All-Star Game, he thought. Pay attention to this.
They had a good inning. After two quick outs, they wrangled a hit and then a walk.
“That’s me on deck,” John remarked, pushing back from the fence.
“John.” Sherlock didn’t move and never took his eyes off the field, but he spoke quickly and firmly. “He’s shaken. He didn’t expect that to be a walk. He doesn’t feel he’s getting the outside corner call, and he’s panicking about it, so he’s going to be heavily inside to you the entire at-bat. You have a reputation for being a poor slider hitter, but that’s an undeserved reputation. You can hit a slider. And I’m telling you that you’re going to see one, first pitch, slider on the inside corner. Don’t let him back you off the plate. Turn on it and push it out. It’s actually an ideal pitch for you.”
John stared at him in surprise.
“Watson!” somebody barked from behind him.
“Yeah,” John said, dazedly. “I’m coming. Sherlock—”
“Hurry up,” Sherlock snapped, impatiently. “I’m right, go out there and prove it.”
John had a sudden flash that he didn’t want to be the thing that proved Sherlock wrong. Not in this instance. Maybe some other time he would relish winning a fight against him. Just now, he stood at the plate in Fenway Park. He had the bases loaded, the result of a beautifully executed bunt by the hitter ahead of him that he beat to first. The pitcher was clearly rattled. The catcher had jogged out to him, and they were having a consultation. They were not from the same team, the AL starting battery, and John knew that made the conference awkward and stilted and not terribly helpful.
John stood by the plate, waiting, thinking, Sherlock thinks it’s going to be a slider, inside corner. Sherlock thinks you can hit a slider. When is Sherlock ever wrong? He’s right that all you need to do is push it. It doesn’t even need to find a hole out there. You can just hit a sacrifice fly. Nobody would think less of you for that. You’d have an RBI in the All-Star Game. John glanced toward the first-base coach, who did nothing but clap twice to indicate that it was John’s at-bat to do as he wished. It was early in the game, Sherlock had been so incredibly dazzling in his first inning, and the American League pitcher was so clearly rattled. The National League was relaxed. It was not a time for strategy. John glanced toward Sherlock, who was steadily watching the AL pitcher and not John.
The umpire went out to break up the conference. The catcher jogged back, looking a bit harried.
John settled into his batting stance. Slider, inside corner, he thought. It’s going to be a slider, inside corner. Don’t think yourself out of it, just swing the bat and push the ball—He hit it in exactly the perfect spot, with exactly the right force. He felt it immediately. In fact, it was so perfect that he couldn’t even begin to think about moving. He wanted to stand there by home plate, finishing up his swing, relishing the perfect vibration of the bat in his hand.
The catcher stood up next to him, pushing his helmet off his head. John was dimly aware of this, as he stood there watching his ball sail into the first row of seats. What the hell, he thought, in disbelief. Did I just hit a grand slam in Fenway Park during the All-Star Game? He looked at the umpire, who was making the signal for home run, and he forced himself to move, to start his trot around the bases. Do. Not. Faint, he told himself, firmly, and kept one foot in front of the other. First base, then second, then third, and the crowd was roaring in his ears, and he was doing a home run trot at Fenway Park in the All-Star Game. The three players who’d been on base were waiting for him at home plate, and they leaped atop him as he got there, and he laughed because he couldn’t help it. The dugout met him, throwing out ecstatic congratulations, and John felt giddy and delighted.
Sherlock was still leaning against the dugout fence, still watching the flustered AL pitcher. “Well done,” he said, mildly, without looking at John, but he didn’t fool John for a minute.
“Smug,” said John.
Sherlock said nothing, but John could see the amusement lurking in his eyes.
“If you can do that all the time, why don’t you?”
“Because I can’t. Tonight is your lucky night, John Watson.” Sherlock straightened from the dugout fence. “And that’s the third out. Let’s go.”
John, feeling like he was walking on air, took up his position behind home plate and did some lazy warming-up with Sherlock, who had been sitting in the dugout for a while and had only thrown four pitches all game. It showed, too, because Sherlock’s first pitch was an uncharacteristic mistake, hit sharply into the hole between second and first. The runner ended up on first, and Sherlock seemed inordinately concerned about him, throwing over twice to cut his lead, which he almost never did. Sherlock normally ignored any runners he allowed.
John called for a time-out and jogged out to the mound. Sherlock waited, frowning at the runner on first as if he’d personally offended him.
“Okay,” John said, holding his glove to his mouth so no one could read his lips. “Shake that off. Who cares about the runner? You’re letting yourself get distracted.”
“Am I?” asked Sherlock, not bothering to hide his own lips.
“Yes,” John replied. “Let’s get a double play right now; he’ll be gone.”
Sherlock nodded once, shortly, and John retreated back to home.
And Sherlock threw back over to first, apparently concerned that the runner might possibly be thinking about stealing second. Bloody stubborn git, John thought, frowning furiously, and finally Sherlock threw a pitch, a fairly bad one, far outside, and the runner at first took off for second, and John came up flinging the ball toward second.
“Out!” the umpire roared, from the tangle of limbs that was second base.
Sherlock looked at him from the pitcher’s mound and, unusually, grinned. John blinked at him in shock and then realized exactly what had happened there.
When the inning was over, John waited for him at the dugout steps and hissed, “You let that runner get on base specifically so I could throw him out.”
“Of course I did,” Sherlock replied, unconcerned. “Did you think that was an accident?”
John shook his head, thinking it was hopeless and Sherlock was fantastic and he wanted to shove him up against the wall and have his way with him, many different ways with him. John was certain that would be allowed once the game was over, which pretty much made what was already shaping up to be the best day of his life inconceivably better.
The score was still 4-0 as they trotted out for the bottom of the fourth. Well, John was trotting out. Sherlock had paused and was speaking to Esteban in rapid-fire Spanish.
“What was that about?” John asked when Sherlock joined him on the dugout steps on the way to the field.
“Nothing.”
“You don’t even talk to our own manager during a game, never mind a strange manager. And you speak Spanish?”
Sherlock gave him his don’t ask stupid questions look and walked out to the pitcher’s mound.
Sherlock dispensed with the first two batters with the efficiency he’d displayed all game, aside from his deliberate mistake with the runner in the second, which, honestly, had thrown off the AL so much that it might as well have been strategy. And, for all John knew, it had been strategy and not just a little gift to John.
But now, with the third batter of the inning up, suddenly they couldn’t get on the same page. Sherlock shook him off and shook him off and shook him off. They hadn’t had such a huge pitching disagreement in ages. John admitted he was annoyed about it. It was the bloody All-Star Game, couldn’t Sherlock just be cooperative for once? Fine, thought John, throw whatever you want. He put his glove in a neutral position.
Sherlock stood on the mound, unmoving, and even from the distance he was at, John could tell he was frowning and unhappy. What the hell.
John called for time again and jogged out to the mound. “What’s the matter?” he demanded from behind his glove. “Are you tired? Do you need a second to breathe?”
“No.” Sherlock had lifted his glove as well, which he so seldom did that John lifted his eyebrows in response. “This is our last inning. Esteban told me before we came out here. So I want you to breathe. I want you to realize that you were voted in by the fans, and it had nothing to do with me. I know you’ve been thinking, in your head, that they just wanted me here and thought they had to ask you along to accomplish it, but it’s not true. They wanted you, and you deserve to be here, and this has been your All-Star Game, John Watson.”
The thought slammed into John, and he realized that he had managed to forget, and trust Sherlock to realize that. He turned from Sherlock, stepped back to stand beside him, and looked up, at Fenway all around them and the sky above that. The crowd noise rushed up to fill in, no longer blocked out in his head automatically by the activity of playing baseball. Cameras flashed all around them, dazzling. Sherlock stood next to him, silent, and John wondered what he was thinking. Because John’s head was a dizzying collage of childhood memories and his own career highlights, all entangled in one huge mess, and he felt drunk with the fact that the only thing he’d ever found in his life that he loved more than baseball was the man currently standing next to him. And as much as he was going to miss this game, he would miss it far less because he’d found this man.
John turned back to him. “Thank you,” he said, gravely. “For everything. All of it. Aside from all the rest of it, this has been…the biggest honor. I mean, it’s meant the world, to catch you. Forget everything else. It’s always… I don’t tell you that often enough.”
“You tell me every single time I throw a pitch at you, John. Never think I don’t know.”
John looked across at him for a second and then nodded, too overwhelmed by everything to come up with any other response. He walked back to home plate, pressing firmly into his memory, to be cherished forever, every single step he took. He felt Sherlock’s eyes watch him all the way back.
Next Chapter
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Date: 2013-08-26 03:38 am (UTC)