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earlgreytea68Title - The Adventures of a Single Girl in London (Plus a Consulting Detective) (4/8)
Author -![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
earlgreytea68
Rating - Teen
Characters - Sherlock, Janine, Mary, John
Spoilers - Through His Last Vow
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 keeps choosing flatmates who fancy themselves to be bloggers.
Author's Notes - Thank you, as usual, toflawedamythyst for the Britpick and arctacuda for the beta. They both have made this fic better.
Chapter 1 - Chapter 2 - Chapter 3
Chapter Four
March 11, 2015
Operation MEN on Permanent Hiatus
You know what it is about love? It just sets you up to get hurt. You can love and love and love and give and give and give, and in the end you don’t get a happily ever after, you just get a broken heart and a couple of empty bottles of wine and a head that aches so much you can’t stand it. And all for the horrific sin of deciding to love someone else more than yourself. Why is that fair? It isn’t.
***
Janine delayed leaving Sherlock’s bedroom in the morning. She wasn’t sure what he was going to say to her, and she was dreading it. It would be well within his rights to be furious with her for what she’d done, but at the same time she honestly thought that clearing the air had been the right thing to do. It had certainly got her thinking a lot more clearly about the mess Sherlock had got himself into where John was concerned.
Sherlock was in the kitchen when she got up enough courage to walk out there. He had a smoking test tube in one hand and was taking notes with the other, and he didn’t look up at her.
She hesitated, then ventured, “Good morning?” She hated that she made it sound like a question.
Sherlock still didn’t look up. “My head is killing me,” he said. “If you were going to get me drunk, you could at least have used better wine than that.”
Janine sat opposite him at the kitchen table and looked at him across the forest of science equipment. She didn’t even know what to call most of it. She said, “Are you angry?”
After a moment, Sherlock sighed and put his pen down. He kept the smoking test tube in his hand and looked up at Janine. “No. You were due a bit of subterfuge, I think.” He hesitated. “I can’t really criticize people for using manipulation against me.” He said it in a bit of a rush, as if it was a new discovery he’d made.
“I just wanted to know,” Janine said, “because I thought it would help me help.”
“Foolish of you. Now I’ve just made everything more dangerous for you because you know something you’re not supposed to know, and I don’t quite trust Mary.”
“You think Mary would shoot me, too? For what purpose?”
“It should be fairly obvious to you now that I can’t predict Mary,” said Sherlock.
“And yet you told John he could trust her,” Janine pointed out.
“Well,” said Sherlock, after a moment, “I don’t like to think that John could fall in love with someone who was irredeemable. But I’m not in love with her, and so I don’t trust her, and so I’m sorry I put you in jeopardy that way.”
“Mary shot you in Magnusson’s office,” Janine said, because she’d made the connection while lying awake in bed the night before. “That meant she was in Magnusson’s office that night, too. Why?”
“He was blackmailing her, of course.”
“Is that why she was friends with me? Just because I worked for Magnusson?”
Sherlock picked up his pen again and resumed writing. “I don’t know. But it’s why I was fake-dating you, and that didn’t seem to bother you.”
Janine considered that. Because that was true. “Hang on, is she the one that hit me over the head?”
“Well, it wasn’t me,” said Sherlock.
Janine frowned, processing.
“Moving on.” Sherlock put his pen back down, as well as the test tube, and leaned back in his chair, crossing his arms, as if that was the conclusion of that conversational topic forever. “Your date with Kevin was less than satisfactory. I would have predicted that. Your red flag was his profession.”
“Poet?”
Sherlock rolled his eyes. “Poet. Please. He was no more a poet than I am. Writing fake profiles for online dating sites. He knew exactly how to lure you in. Oldest trick in the book.”
“Writing fake profiles for online dating sites is the oldest trick in the book?” said Janine.
“It’s a figure of speech,” grumbled Sherlock.
"Mycroft said he was an assassin.”
“Oh, and now Mycroft’s brilliant at spotting assassins in our midst.”
“Can I say something about John Watson?” asked Janine, tentatively.
“No,” said Sherlock, sharply. “You can’t. I’m going to forgive you for getting me drunk and manipulating me in exchange for you never mentioning any of that ever again.”
“Do you think it’s a secret, Sherlock? That you’re in love with him? Ninety percent of the people at that wedding knew you were in love with him by the time you finished your best man speech. You don’t see the way you look at him. You give it away.”
Sherlock frowned. “Well, you never found it necessary to discuss it before last night, so—”
“I’m not sure he’s good for you,” Janine blurted out. “I mean, things were going well. Don’t you think things were going well? And then he walked back into your life and you’re sad now and—”
“I’m fine,” Sherlock retorted. “I’m certainly not sad.”
“Fine,” said Janine, after a second. “But maybe just…leave him off the next few cases.” Janine wanted to say, I don’t think it’s doing you any good to remind yourself what you lost, to take him with you and pine over the fact that he goes home to someone else. She didn’t.
Sherlock said, “I didn’t know about your fiancé. I knew you’d been hurt, but I didn’t bother to get into the details. I didn’t know it was so…I mean, you’re still so hopeful about finding love. You’re very…forgiving. And optimistic.”
Sherlock spoke cautiously, as if such traits were so foreign to him that he wasn’t sure he was naming them properly. But Janine thought things she didn’t say: that she had loved her fiancé but she had determined, after he had turned out to be a lying cheat, that he hadn’t been The One for her; that The One was still out there; that Sherlock had already determined that John was his One and didn’t seem likely to be dissuaded by anything if he hadn’t been dissuaded by John choosing a woman who had shot him. She wanted to tell Sherlock he had to move on, the way John had when Sherlock had been dead, but she didn’t think Sherlock would even understand the concept. For Sherlock, the conversation began and ended with John Watson: He was perfect.
Janine said, “Would you have done it differently? If you’d known?”
Sherlock thought about that for a moment. “I’d like to say yes,” he decided, finally.
Janine grinned at him. “But you wouldn’t have.”
“No,” Sherlock admitted. “Probably not.”
Janine stood, intending to go take a shower, and said, lightly, “You are a heartless sociopath. How did I end up with you for a best friend?”
She’d meant it as a joke, but Sherlock blinked up at her in astonishment. “Am I your best friend?”
“Of course you are,” Janine said, quizzically. “I haven’t got any others, do I? One shagged my fiancé and the other one’s an assassin. In comparison, you look like Mother Teresa.”
Sherlock was so solemn looking up at her that for a moment she couldn’t move. She waited for what he was going to say next.
What he said was, “I read your blog entry. Some people do get the happily-ever-after. I’m going to find it for you.”
Janine smiled at him. “See, that’s what makes you a good best friend.”
“But if you tell anyone about the rest of the things I said last night—you know, all of it—I will not be pleased,” said Sherlock, sternly. “It was meant to be a secret, and it’s got to stay a secret. It’s the only way to keep everyone safe.”
“I’m not going to tell anyone. But even if I did betray your trust, I know your secret.” She waggled her finger at him.
Sherlock regarded the finger with dubious distaste. “What’s that?”
“You would never shoot me,” said Janine, and kissed his cheek.
***
March 12, 2015
Shezza, of all people, says I shouldn’t give up on Operation MEN. I told him I need a break, though. Maybe I just need a little girl-time instead.
Comments
You were unclear with your preference. If you wanted girls, you should have told me earlier. –Shezza
Not like that. But thanks for your concern. –J
***
Janine was weirdly nervous, considering that all she was doing was meeting a woman for lunch whose wedding she had been in. But, when she stopped to think about it, she and Mary had not spoken since the night Janine had been hit over the head. Presumably by Mary herself. And now, knowing everything she knew about Mary, Janine thought she was justified in being nervous.
But Mary came in and gave her a hug, just like normal. She was hugely pregnant, and Janine tried to do the maths in her head. How much longer until there was a baby? Would John call Sherlock? Would that throw Sherlock off the rails again?
Mary sat and said, “So, you didn’t tell me about you and Sherlock.” She looked at her archly, lifting an eyebrow, as if Janine had been under some kind of obligation to tell Mary about that.
And suddenly the whole thing rubbed Janine the wrong way. “You didn’t tell me that you’re an assassin who only befriended me to get to Magnusson,” she retorted, and then bit her tongue. Oh, bugger. Sherlock was going to kill her when he found out she’d let Mary know she knew. Well, not literally kill her. Janine would leave the killing to Mary.
The expression on Mary’s face froze in shock, and then, after a moment, turned cold. “Is that what he told you?”
“I believe him,” Janine said, because she didn’t feel like listening to the lie Mary would attempt to tell, and because she did believe Sherlock. The entire story was too outrageous for him to make up.
“He did the same thing, you know: got close to you to get to Magnusson.” Mary sipped some of her water.
“I know,” Janine said, evenly. “You’re both jerks.”
“So is that why you called me for lunch? So you could cry about something I was in the past, before I ever knew you?” Mary looked bored.
“No,” said Janine. “Honestly, I didn’t intend to say anything about it at all. In fact, I promised Sherlock I wouldn’t. So I’m going to get an earful about that. But no, really I wanted to talk to you about something entirely different.”
“Okay,” said Mary, cautiously, plainly trying to sort out what it could be.
Janine swallowed and looked at Mary and said, “I want you to keep John away from Sherlock.”
Mary blinked. “What?”
“I know it’s not really any of my business, but, well, the truth is Sherlock kind of is my business now.”
Mary lifted her eyebrows. “And you’re jealous of John?”
“No,” Janine said, truthfully, because she wasn’t.
“Getting between the two of them is not the way to win Sherlock over.”
I don’t want to win Sherlock over, thought Janine. I just want to stop watching him die day-by-day in front of me. Janine said, “I’m not the one who got between the two of them.”
“Oh,” said Mary, defensively. “I suppose you think that was me. I have been nothing but entirely supportive of their friendship. I let John run around on cases and I never say a word. I tell him to go get cases.”
“I know,” said Janine. “And I’m asking if you could give it a break. For me.”
Mary narrowed her eyes, looking at her in apparent astonishment. “Do you really fancy Sherlock? After everything he did?”
Janine didn’t. But Janine thought it was better to protect Sherlock. Better to say that than No, but Sherlock is so in love with your husband that you’re crushing him, whether you intend to or not. Janine thought Mary must know the way Sherlock felt, or at least suspect, but Janine was determined not to increase Sherlock’s vulnerability with Mary by saying it out loud. It was bad enough that Sherlock had to live every day with his belief that Mary had beaten him.
So Janine said, “You of all people shouldn’t knock forgiveness.” When Mary looked appropriately contrite, she said, “Look. We used to be friends, right? I miss being friends. So I’m asking you, friend to friend, if you could give me a little room to work with Sherlock here, some non-John space in his head.”
Mary gave her a brilliant smile and said, “Oh, Janine, of course, absolutely.”
Afterwards, Janine reflected that she was getting much better at being a sociopath.
***
John said, “I thought I might text Sherlock,” and Mary said, “Do you think that’s a good idea?”
They were cuddled together, watching the telly, and it was the telly that John blinked at in surprise, because he thought it would have been too dramatic to jostle Mary just so he could face her. “Yeah,” he said, and hated that he said it a bit belligerently. “And so do you, usually,” he couldn’t resist pointing out.
“Mmm,” Mary said, mildly. “It’s just that, I don’t know, maybe we all just need a bit more…space?”
John stared at the television in silence, turning this over in his head. “Is this about Janine’s ridiculous blog?”
“Her what?”
“Her blog.”
Mary jostled herself so she could look at John, but John kept looking at the television. “Janine’s blog?”
“She has a blog, you know,” said John. “I showed it to you.”
“Have you been reading it?”
He read it religiously. It was ridiculous. “No,” he said, but he knew Mary would know he was lying, because Mary always knew when he was lying. He didn’t have the same trait. He had rather the opposite trait. He had the trait of Never Knowing What Was Bloody Going On Until People Saw Fit To Finally Tell Him.
“You’re not jealous of her blog, are you?” said Mary. “I told you to start up your blog again. I thought you would feel better.”
“I don’t want this—” He gestured around the room vaguely. “—to be part of that.” He gestured over his shoulder, by which he meant to indicate the entire world outside.
“I know. And it’s a sweet impulse. But you like writing, and you should do more of it.” Mary rested her head on his shoulder, snuggled hard.
He didn’t actually like writing. He thought it was easy to make the mistake of thinking so. He’d made the mistake himself. But he’d opened up his blog to write a thousand times and he had never made it past the blank screen. He didn’t like writing; he liked writing about Sherlock.
And a part of him really hated himself, because he had Mary, and the baby coming, and maybe things had been a bit of a slog between them but Mary had turned out to still be Mary, the woman he had fallen in love with and married. There were lots of days when he could imagine that the entire assassin episode had been some sort of fevered hallucination. Most of the time, he thought that he and Mary were going to work out, he really did.
But it didn’t matter. Even on the good days, on the very best days with Mary, he missed Sherlock. When Sherlock had been dead, that had been true as well, but John could dismiss that as grief, as a relationship that had ended in the middle of the story, the lack of resolution haunting him forever. But now he didn’t have that excuse anymore. He could resolve the relationship; he had resolved the relationship. He had tried, very hard, to make the two separate lives work, and it had worked, almost, for a while, before everything that had happened. And that was what happened: Life changed, it moved on, you drifted apart from some people and closer to others. It just happened.
But John missed Sherlock with a sharp and unrelenting ache. John missed Sherlock even when he was with Sherlock. Because nothing was ever going to be the same again, and the regret over that was a sour throb in his veins. He should have been a content man, anticipating the birth of his first child, a brand new adventure, and instead he was bored and sad and oddly lonely, even though he was almost never alone.
The person that he wanted was Sherlock. And sometimes that worried him. Because when he was with Sherlock, he didn’t seem to miss Mary that way. When he was with Sherlock, even now, the way they were, there was no room for anyone else but the two of them. He could tell that even Sherlock thought that; it wasn’t like Sherlock had asked his new best friend Janine to tag along with them ever.
And John worried about that. Shouldn’t it be the other way around? Shouldn’t it be Mary who he missed at all times? How had he managed to confuse that so much? How had he managed to make this incredible mess of his life?
Next Chapter
Author -
earlgreytea68Rating - Teen
Characters - Sherlock, Janine, Mary, John
Spoilers - Through His Last Vow
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 keeps choosing flatmates who fancy themselves to be bloggers.
Author's Notes - Thank you, as usual, to
flawedamythyst for the Britpick and arctacuda for the beta. They both have made this fic better.Chapter 1 - Chapter 2 - Chapter 3
Chapter Four
March 11, 2015
Operation MEN on Permanent Hiatus
You know what it is about love? It just sets you up to get hurt. You can love and love and love and give and give and give, and in the end you don’t get a happily ever after, you just get a broken heart and a couple of empty bottles of wine and a head that aches so much you can’t stand it. And all for the horrific sin of deciding to love someone else more than yourself. Why is that fair? It isn’t.
***
Janine delayed leaving Sherlock’s bedroom in the morning. She wasn’t sure what he was going to say to her, and she was dreading it. It would be well within his rights to be furious with her for what she’d done, but at the same time she honestly thought that clearing the air had been the right thing to do. It had certainly got her thinking a lot more clearly about the mess Sherlock had got himself into where John was concerned.
Sherlock was in the kitchen when she got up enough courage to walk out there. He had a smoking test tube in one hand and was taking notes with the other, and he didn’t look up at her.
She hesitated, then ventured, “Good morning?” She hated that she made it sound like a question.
Sherlock still didn’t look up. “My head is killing me,” he said. “If you were going to get me drunk, you could at least have used better wine than that.”
Janine sat opposite him at the kitchen table and looked at him across the forest of science equipment. She didn’t even know what to call most of it. She said, “Are you angry?”
After a moment, Sherlock sighed and put his pen down. He kept the smoking test tube in his hand and looked up at Janine. “No. You were due a bit of subterfuge, I think.” He hesitated. “I can’t really criticize people for using manipulation against me.” He said it in a bit of a rush, as if it was a new discovery he’d made.
“I just wanted to know,” Janine said, “because I thought it would help me help.”
“Foolish of you. Now I’ve just made everything more dangerous for you because you know something you’re not supposed to know, and I don’t quite trust Mary.”
“You think Mary would shoot me, too? For what purpose?”
“It should be fairly obvious to you now that I can’t predict Mary,” said Sherlock.
“And yet you told John he could trust her,” Janine pointed out.
“Well,” said Sherlock, after a moment, “I don’t like to think that John could fall in love with someone who was irredeemable. But I’m not in love with her, and so I don’t trust her, and so I’m sorry I put you in jeopardy that way.”
“Mary shot you in Magnusson’s office,” Janine said, because she’d made the connection while lying awake in bed the night before. “That meant she was in Magnusson’s office that night, too. Why?”
“He was blackmailing her, of course.”
“Is that why she was friends with me? Just because I worked for Magnusson?”
Sherlock picked up his pen again and resumed writing. “I don’t know. But it’s why I was fake-dating you, and that didn’t seem to bother you.”
Janine considered that. Because that was true. “Hang on, is she the one that hit me over the head?”
“Well, it wasn’t me,” said Sherlock.
Janine frowned, processing.
“Moving on.” Sherlock put his pen back down, as well as the test tube, and leaned back in his chair, crossing his arms, as if that was the conclusion of that conversational topic forever. “Your date with Kevin was less than satisfactory. I would have predicted that. Your red flag was his profession.”
“Poet?”
Sherlock rolled his eyes. “Poet. Please. He was no more a poet than I am. Writing fake profiles for online dating sites. He knew exactly how to lure you in. Oldest trick in the book.”
“Writing fake profiles for online dating sites is the oldest trick in the book?” said Janine.
“It’s a figure of speech,” grumbled Sherlock.
"Mycroft said he was an assassin.”
“Oh, and now Mycroft’s brilliant at spotting assassins in our midst.”
“Can I say something about John Watson?” asked Janine, tentatively.
“No,” said Sherlock, sharply. “You can’t. I’m going to forgive you for getting me drunk and manipulating me in exchange for you never mentioning any of that ever again.”
“Do you think it’s a secret, Sherlock? That you’re in love with him? Ninety percent of the people at that wedding knew you were in love with him by the time you finished your best man speech. You don’t see the way you look at him. You give it away.”
Sherlock frowned. “Well, you never found it necessary to discuss it before last night, so—”
“I’m not sure he’s good for you,” Janine blurted out. “I mean, things were going well. Don’t you think things were going well? And then he walked back into your life and you’re sad now and—”
“I’m fine,” Sherlock retorted. “I’m certainly not sad.”
“Fine,” said Janine, after a second. “But maybe just…leave him off the next few cases.” Janine wanted to say, I don’t think it’s doing you any good to remind yourself what you lost, to take him with you and pine over the fact that he goes home to someone else. She didn’t.
Sherlock said, “I didn’t know about your fiancé. I knew you’d been hurt, but I didn’t bother to get into the details. I didn’t know it was so…I mean, you’re still so hopeful about finding love. You’re very…forgiving. And optimistic.”
Sherlock spoke cautiously, as if such traits were so foreign to him that he wasn’t sure he was naming them properly. But Janine thought things she didn’t say: that she had loved her fiancé but she had determined, after he had turned out to be a lying cheat, that he hadn’t been The One for her; that The One was still out there; that Sherlock had already determined that John was his One and didn’t seem likely to be dissuaded by anything if he hadn’t been dissuaded by John choosing a woman who had shot him. She wanted to tell Sherlock he had to move on, the way John had when Sherlock had been dead, but she didn’t think Sherlock would even understand the concept. For Sherlock, the conversation began and ended with John Watson: He was perfect.
Janine said, “Would you have done it differently? If you’d known?”
Sherlock thought about that for a moment. “I’d like to say yes,” he decided, finally.
Janine grinned at him. “But you wouldn’t have.”
“No,” Sherlock admitted. “Probably not.”
Janine stood, intending to go take a shower, and said, lightly, “You are a heartless sociopath. How did I end up with you for a best friend?”
She’d meant it as a joke, but Sherlock blinked up at her in astonishment. “Am I your best friend?”
“Of course you are,” Janine said, quizzically. “I haven’t got any others, do I? One shagged my fiancé and the other one’s an assassin. In comparison, you look like Mother Teresa.”
Sherlock was so solemn looking up at her that for a moment she couldn’t move. She waited for what he was going to say next.
What he said was, “I read your blog entry. Some people do get the happily-ever-after. I’m going to find it for you.”
Janine smiled at him. “See, that’s what makes you a good best friend.”
“But if you tell anyone about the rest of the things I said last night—you know, all of it—I will not be pleased,” said Sherlock, sternly. “It was meant to be a secret, and it’s got to stay a secret. It’s the only way to keep everyone safe.”
“I’m not going to tell anyone. But even if I did betray your trust, I know your secret.” She waggled her finger at him.
Sherlock regarded the finger with dubious distaste. “What’s that?”
“You would never shoot me,” said Janine, and kissed his cheek.
***
March 12, 2015
Shezza, of all people, says I shouldn’t give up on Operation MEN. I told him I need a break, though. Maybe I just need a little girl-time instead.
Comments
You were unclear with your preference. If you wanted girls, you should have told me earlier. –Shezza
Not like that. But thanks for your concern. –J
***
Janine was weirdly nervous, considering that all she was doing was meeting a woman for lunch whose wedding she had been in. But, when she stopped to think about it, she and Mary had not spoken since the night Janine had been hit over the head. Presumably by Mary herself. And now, knowing everything she knew about Mary, Janine thought she was justified in being nervous.
But Mary came in and gave her a hug, just like normal. She was hugely pregnant, and Janine tried to do the maths in her head. How much longer until there was a baby? Would John call Sherlock? Would that throw Sherlock off the rails again?
Mary sat and said, “So, you didn’t tell me about you and Sherlock.” She looked at her archly, lifting an eyebrow, as if Janine had been under some kind of obligation to tell Mary about that.
And suddenly the whole thing rubbed Janine the wrong way. “You didn’t tell me that you’re an assassin who only befriended me to get to Magnusson,” she retorted, and then bit her tongue. Oh, bugger. Sherlock was going to kill her when he found out she’d let Mary know she knew. Well, not literally kill her. Janine would leave the killing to Mary.
The expression on Mary’s face froze in shock, and then, after a moment, turned cold. “Is that what he told you?”
“I believe him,” Janine said, because she didn’t feel like listening to the lie Mary would attempt to tell, and because she did believe Sherlock. The entire story was too outrageous for him to make up.
“He did the same thing, you know: got close to you to get to Magnusson.” Mary sipped some of her water.
“I know,” Janine said, evenly. “You’re both jerks.”
“So is that why you called me for lunch? So you could cry about something I was in the past, before I ever knew you?” Mary looked bored.
“No,” said Janine. “Honestly, I didn’t intend to say anything about it at all. In fact, I promised Sherlock I wouldn’t. So I’m going to get an earful about that. But no, really I wanted to talk to you about something entirely different.”
“Okay,” said Mary, cautiously, plainly trying to sort out what it could be.
Janine swallowed and looked at Mary and said, “I want you to keep John away from Sherlock.”
Mary blinked. “What?”
“I know it’s not really any of my business, but, well, the truth is Sherlock kind of is my business now.”
Mary lifted her eyebrows. “And you’re jealous of John?”
“No,” Janine said, truthfully, because she wasn’t.
“Getting between the two of them is not the way to win Sherlock over.”
I don’t want to win Sherlock over, thought Janine. I just want to stop watching him die day-by-day in front of me. Janine said, “I’m not the one who got between the two of them.”
“Oh,” said Mary, defensively. “I suppose you think that was me. I have been nothing but entirely supportive of their friendship. I let John run around on cases and I never say a word. I tell him to go get cases.”
“I know,” said Janine. “And I’m asking if you could give it a break. For me.”
Mary narrowed her eyes, looking at her in apparent astonishment. “Do you really fancy Sherlock? After everything he did?”
Janine didn’t. But Janine thought it was better to protect Sherlock. Better to say that than No, but Sherlock is so in love with your husband that you’re crushing him, whether you intend to or not. Janine thought Mary must know the way Sherlock felt, or at least suspect, but Janine was determined not to increase Sherlock’s vulnerability with Mary by saying it out loud. It was bad enough that Sherlock had to live every day with his belief that Mary had beaten him.
So Janine said, “You of all people shouldn’t knock forgiveness.” When Mary looked appropriately contrite, she said, “Look. We used to be friends, right? I miss being friends. So I’m asking you, friend to friend, if you could give me a little room to work with Sherlock here, some non-John space in his head.”
Mary gave her a brilliant smile and said, “Oh, Janine, of course, absolutely.”
Afterwards, Janine reflected that she was getting much better at being a sociopath.
***
John said, “I thought I might text Sherlock,” and Mary said, “Do you think that’s a good idea?”
They were cuddled together, watching the telly, and it was the telly that John blinked at in surprise, because he thought it would have been too dramatic to jostle Mary just so he could face her. “Yeah,” he said, and hated that he said it a bit belligerently. “And so do you, usually,” he couldn’t resist pointing out.
“Mmm,” Mary said, mildly. “It’s just that, I don’t know, maybe we all just need a bit more…space?”
John stared at the television in silence, turning this over in his head. “Is this about Janine’s ridiculous blog?”
“Her what?”
“Her blog.”
Mary jostled herself so she could look at John, but John kept looking at the television. “Janine’s blog?”
“She has a blog, you know,” said John. “I showed it to you.”
“Have you been reading it?”
He read it religiously. It was ridiculous. “No,” he said, but he knew Mary would know he was lying, because Mary always knew when he was lying. He didn’t have the same trait. He had rather the opposite trait. He had the trait of Never Knowing What Was Bloody Going On Until People Saw Fit To Finally Tell Him.
“You’re not jealous of her blog, are you?” said Mary. “I told you to start up your blog again. I thought you would feel better.”
“I don’t want this—” He gestured around the room vaguely. “—to be part of that.” He gestured over his shoulder, by which he meant to indicate the entire world outside.
“I know. And it’s a sweet impulse. But you like writing, and you should do more of it.” Mary rested her head on his shoulder, snuggled hard.
He didn’t actually like writing. He thought it was easy to make the mistake of thinking so. He’d made the mistake himself. But he’d opened up his blog to write a thousand times and he had never made it past the blank screen. He didn’t like writing; he liked writing about Sherlock.
And a part of him really hated himself, because he had Mary, and the baby coming, and maybe things had been a bit of a slog between them but Mary had turned out to still be Mary, the woman he had fallen in love with and married. There were lots of days when he could imagine that the entire assassin episode had been some sort of fevered hallucination. Most of the time, he thought that he and Mary were going to work out, he really did.
But it didn’t matter. Even on the good days, on the very best days with Mary, he missed Sherlock. When Sherlock had been dead, that had been true as well, but John could dismiss that as grief, as a relationship that had ended in the middle of the story, the lack of resolution haunting him forever. But now he didn’t have that excuse anymore. He could resolve the relationship; he had resolved the relationship. He had tried, very hard, to make the two separate lives work, and it had worked, almost, for a while, before everything that had happened. And that was what happened: Life changed, it moved on, you drifted apart from some people and closer to others. It just happened.
But John missed Sherlock with a sharp and unrelenting ache. John missed Sherlock even when he was with Sherlock. Because nothing was ever going to be the same again, and the regret over that was a sour throb in his veins. He should have been a content man, anticipating the birth of his first child, a brand new adventure, and instead he was bored and sad and oddly lonely, even though he was almost never alone.
The person that he wanted was Sherlock. And sometimes that worried him. Because when he was with Sherlock, he didn’t seem to miss Mary that way. When he was with Sherlock, even now, the way they were, there was no room for anyone else but the two of them. He could tell that even Sherlock thought that; it wasn’t like Sherlock had asked his new best friend Janine to tag along with them ever.
And John worried about that. Shouldn’t it be the other way around? Shouldn’t it be Mary who he missed at all times? How had he managed to confuse that so much? How had he managed to make this incredible mess of his life?
Next Chapter
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no subject
Date: 2014-02-24 05:11 am (UTC)(But I hope Mary doesn't try to assassinate her. Someone who makes up arguably flattering lies to sell to the press instead of mean ones is just not a danger, and Mary needs to understand that.)
(Right?)
***
ETA: I find it utterly sweet that Janine can't keep a secret for three minutes for her own safety, but absolutely can when it's for a friend.
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Date: 2014-02-25 04:33 am (UTC)And Janine really is just thinking of Sherlock, but it's true that her behavior has the happy side effect of making John *think.*
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Date: 2014-02-25 05:23 am (UTC)YES! You could see this exact reaction at the wedding--first Sherlock is all "What the heck?!" and then he relaxes around her.
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Date: 2014-02-26 04:25 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-02-26 05:00 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-02-26 05:07 am (UTC)ETA: Oops, that was me, that Anon, I got an error message and thought it didn't post. *embarrassed*
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Date: 2014-02-24 06:31 am (UTC)I love the image of Sherlock just standing there during his convo with Janine with a smoking test tube in his hand, its just the perfect image of him.
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Date: 2014-02-24 01:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-02-25 04:45 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-02-24 02:27 pm (UTC)”…she had determined, after he had turned out to be a lying cheat, that he hadn’t been The One for her; that The One was still out there; that Sherlock had already determined that John was his One and didn’t seem likely to be dissuaded by anything if he hadn’t been dissuaded by John choosing a woman who had shot him.”
Oh that’s beautiful – a perfect example for Janine (and everyone, really!) to follow.
”Afterwards, Janine reflected that she was getting much better at being a sociopath.”
Hee, you go girl!!
”He had the trait of Never Knowing What Was Bloody Going On Until People Saw Fit To Finally Tell Him.”
Oh poor John? He shouldn’t really think that, although based on experience, he might be right! *grin*
”Even on the good days, on the very best days with Mary, he missed Sherlock.”
Oh! And now we get to the truth . . .
”When he was with Sherlock, even now, the way they were, there was no room for anyone else but the two of them.”
So, John, it’s up to you to sort yourself out . . .
no subject
Date: 2014-02-25 04:43 am (UTC)Poor John, he really is so out of sorts and he hasn't had any time or opportunity to make any of what he's feeling make sense to him.
no subject
Date: 2014-02-24 09:04 pm (UTC)And ooooooh no, Mary!
But, Joooohn! Come on!
^_^
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Date: 2014-02-25 06:08 pm (UTC)I am totally adoring Janine. She's such an amazing friend to Sherlock, although a little too cavalier with her own safety, letting an assassin know she knows what she is. Hope Mary doesn't try something incredibly stupid.
no subject
Date: 2014-02-26 04:19 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-03-03 10:32 pm (UTC)If you weren't the author I'd be pretty worried right now. :D
“I’m not sure he’s good for you,” Janine blurted out.
Hey, you! I mean, I like you, Janine, but you're not allowed to say such things! Yes, I know you mean good but... *is really emotionally involved in your fic. As always, yes.*
Some people do get the happily-ever-after.
Aaaaah!
I’m going to find it for you.
Aww. *is especially articulate tonight* Such a sociopath, yes.
Janine swallowed and looked at Mary and said, “I want you to keep John away from Sherlock.”
*looks daggers at Janine*
“Getting between the two of them is not the way to win Sherlock over.”
And you know a thing or two about that, you manipulative bi... I mean, person.
“She has a blog, you know,” said John. “I showed it to you.”
“Have you been reading it?”
He read it religiously. It was ridiculous.
It's also his only way of keeping up with Sherlock's day-to-day life, now. Reading someone else's blog. *sobs inwardly*
Most of the time, he thought that he and Mary were going to work out, he really did.
*pretends this sentence doesn't exist*
He could tell that even Sherlock thought that; it wasn’t like Sherlock had asked his new best friend Janine to tag along with them ever.
"His new best friend". Ow, poor John, who really believes that.
Right, Janine's idea of keeping John away from Sherlock may not be so bad after all, if it leads to an epiphany for John and he realises he married the wrong person. You know, what JK Rowling recently said about Hermione who should have married Harry, not Ron? Well, one day Mofftiss will say the same about John and Sherlock. *deludes herself like crazy*
no subject
Date: 2014-03-04 04:25 am (UTC)Poor John feels so locked out of Sherlock's life and so sad about that. Janine didn't ask for the distance to manipulate John but it is having that unintended consequence.