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I am Disappeared
Sense memory. It’s distracting and devastating and wholly unwelcome as John finally allows himself to grieve.
He’s doing fine, really he is. Desperately clinging to normalcy is all he can hope for these days, as normal a life as he used to have. Back when he was boring. Back when he was useless. Back when nothing mattered. Back when a night alone in his bedsit was spent cleaning and assessing the heavy weight of his illegal Sig, cool and unyielding against his palm. Uninteresting and useless John Watson.
The life he’d shared with Sherlock seems like a dream now, cruel and merciless as the memories flooding his brain. Yesterday morning Sherlock had been in his bed, lazily licking trails of fire up John’s spine as he whispered nonsense into John’s skin. If John was honest, he’d noticed Sherlock acting distant and the sex that morning had a desperation to it that John had been too drunk on endorphins to focus on at the time. Now he wishes he could have said something more, proven somehow to his impossible lover that whatever was going on in his big, expansive brain could be solved without such irrevocable consequences.
The sex yesterday morning had felt more like making love, actually. It had been slow and sweet, more about tactile sensation than urgency. John feels stupid. Stupid stupid stupid. How did he not see at the time? The sex had been emotion. It had been I love you. It had been goodbye.
He can still feel Sherlock’s lips against his, showing him with actions and complete focus all the words he’s never said. The words he will never say. John never said them either, afraid of his own overwhelming attachment, and (if he’s honest) a little afraid that if he says them, Sherlock will leave. Will turn away. Will mock him for his sentiment. Will not love him back.
Now he’ll never know. Perhaps if he’d said them… but John can’t think about that. He’s already drowning in emotions, in grief. There’s anger there, yes, but more overpowering still is the guilt. He feels responsible, as if Sherlock’s fall had been his own doing. How could he have thought, even for one moment that this brilliant, incomprehensible, impossible man was his? He couldn’t tame Sherlock any more than he could tame the wind. He didn’t want to.
He can still smell him on the pillows. John finds himself burying his face in the cotton, inhaling the woody scent of his absurdly expensive aftershave and choking on his own tears. If he immerses himself enough, doesn't let himself breath anything but the smell of Sherlock, he can almost pretend that he's just gotten up for the day and that John will find him in the sitting room, working through a concerto or just sitting in his chair, staring, winding through the pathways and vast rooms of his Mind Palace. If he doesn’t allow himself to breathe anything but the remembered scent of Sherlock’s skin, the overwhelming grief can be held at bay. If he doesn’t allow himself to breathe, the ache in his chest feels more like oxygen deprivation. If he doesn’t allow himself to breathe.
John is meant to follow Sherlock. It has been his life for the past eighteen months. It was a life he enjoyed, loved even. Needed, certainly. He began following him that first night and he would follow him anywhere. Except... Sherlock has gone somewhere John cannot follow now. He could, theoretically. Metaphysically. He has the means and certainly the motive. Almost unconsciously, his fingers run again over the smooth metal, warmed now by his touch. It is clean and functioning, John is absolutely certain.
It would be so easy.
Except John doesn't believe in religion. It would be comforting, he knows, but there's more horror in this world than any deity could ever imagine, so John doesn't believe. He knows that if he follows Sherlock, this one last time, there will be no happy reunion. No pearly gates. Sherlock is not waiting for him on the edge of a half-forgotten dream.
John would rather be here with the memory of Sherlock, with the smell of him on cotton sheets, with the taste of him still lingering in the corners of his mouth than dead and never able to remember the exact colour and shape of pale irises in the dark.
It hurts. Christ, it hurts. It feels like his heart has been shredded, pulsing through his veins in tiny pieces that get lodged in arteries, cutting off blood flow. He's certain that's why his legs gave out on the pavement. He's certain that's why his right leg pains him now. There is a tiny Sherlock-shaped piece of his heart lodged in his femoral artery, cutting off circulation to his right leg and causing him to limp. There's a piece stuck between his shoulder blades, rubbing raw with every box of rubbish he packs away. There's one tearing through his left shoulder, causing the scarred bullet wound to pulse with fresh phantom blood. There's another stuck in his brain, causing a constant loop of Sherlock's low baritone saying John, John, John, John.
There's one in his forefinger, halting the progress of the trigger.
The only place he doesn't feel his heart is between his spinal column and his ribs, where it should be beating. John is fairly certain he is going to dry up, shrivel into nothing and float away on the fog rolling off the Thames. There simply isn't enough liquid in his body to account for the moisture constantly flowing down his cheeks, over his chin and into his jumper. At some point, it must dry up, right? He can't be a fountain of tears, never ending and eternal, surely. His body is only 78% water, after all. Eventually it will cease.
Perhaps then he will be able to sleep.
Every time John closes his eyes, he is beset with images and memories. He's not sure which are worse, the pictures of Sherlock's face, bloody and bruised, pale eyes flat and unresponsive or images of Sherlock's face caught in the clear moment of ecstasy, head thrown back and cheeks flushed, mouth open and gasping around the shape of John's name.
The silence is so oppressive in the flat that he can barely think. He keeps listening for the sound of light footfalls on the stairs, two at a time and urgent. The sound of the refrigerator door being opened and rummaged through in search of yet another commandeered body part. The sound of violin music floating up the stairs at half three, jarring and discordant in its fury.
The sound of John's name, gasped and pleading, insistent and impatient, harsh and furious, laughed and caressed, rumbled and full of promise. He will never understand how Sherlock could put so much meaning into one small syllable.
He tries to sleep in their bed. Sherlock’s bed. It’s easier to pretend this has all been one horrible, malicious dream with the smell of stale sweat and old chemicals clinging to obscenely high thread count, but it’s not. John knows it’s not. He’s already stolen the imprint left in the pillow with his blundering musings, like a crime scene stripped of data. There’s still a shallow dip in the mattress, sheets rumpled and twisted around what used to be a wiry body, lithe and pale and glowing in the moonlight. John can’t bring himself to disturb it, terrified that if he sleeps here, he’ll roll over in his dreams and crush the memory of skin and bone, weight redistributing the lines and forms.
It’s all he has left now, and he won’t sacrifice it.
When the silence gets to be too much, too overpowering and repressive, he walks. At first he walks around Westminster, through the winding pathways of Regent’s Park and between the buildings and alleyways. When this proves too much, alleys and rubbish skips stinking of murders and police tape, he widens his cast. He walks through greater London, ignoring the pull of black cabs and take away, of rumbling lorries and their dark promise, of tourists and their damn A-Zs.
Wherever he goes, he sees a fall of charcoal wool, whipped round the corner of an unassuming building. He sees tall, lanky legs skipping effortlessly over fire escapes and rooftop gardens. He sees pale eyes, intense and assessing, raking him over with a scrutiny born of intrigue. He racks his brain for answers, feeling as though they’re just out of reach, in his peripheral and on the tip of his tongue.
You see, but you do not observe.
He flees to Mrs. Hudson’s flat, but the smell of her mince pies in the oven, the heavy swing of her beaded curtains and the cloying sweetness of her good intentions make his stomach turn. He meets Greg for a pint. Six pints, actually and half a bottle of cheap scotch, but the empty stillness of the flat when he returns makes every sound echo tenfold and his gasping sobs morph into hyena laughter, mocking and disdainful. He talks to Molly, cramped up on her overstuffed sofa, drinking tea that tastes like him, her flat smelling inexplicably like dark musk and London rain and warm, pale skin in the darkness of adrenaline fueled nights.
Then she says it, the thing they’ve never said, and he feels what’s left of his heart shatter, brittle and cracked, scraping raw over his skin and settling deep into the recesses of memory.
The pain in his leg is nothing to the pain in his chest. The feel of a bullet, screaming through muscle and tendon, ricocheting off of bone and cartilage is nothing to the empty cavity beneath his ribs. The taste of cold steel, gritty with fresh oil and weighty intent is nothing to the taste of remembered lips, warm and pliant and delicious as danger. The dreams of war, of terrified Afghani children and firefights, of hot explosions and cold desert nights are nothing to the dreams of elegant fingers, clever and inquisitive, dipping into subtle shadows and tight spaces and demanding more.
He wakes one morning, two days after with the sound of Sherlock’s rumbling voice echoing in his head. He can still feel his skin tingling with warmth, radiating heat where Sherlock’s palms had been moments before. He can feel the thick swell of Sherlock’s cock inside him, stretching him impossibly tight, as though any minute he will snap, recoil in on himself in an implosion of sensation. He can feel the threat of tears welling up in his throat, but he has no more to shed. His eyes remain dry and unfocused, holding desperately onto the sense memories, the feel of surprisingly soft curls through his fingers, the press of wool against his denims, the smell of musk and adrenaline.
John hasn’t eaten in three days.
He suddenly understands Sherlock’s blatant disregard for nutrition. Food curdles in his stomach, cramping and foreign until he gives up and loses it into the Stages of Greif. One can live on tea and toast, after all. His medical training disagrees, but he’s seen Sherlock do it for over a year now. If it worked for his impossible caustic idiotic genius flat mate lover, it can work for him.
There are precisely seventeen different types of orange marmalade at Waitrose. John gets stuck standing in front of them, caught in the endless loop of wondering and indecision. Sherlock had liked marmalade. It had been a useful discovery of John’s one morning, post-orgasmic haze muddling his hunger responses and making Sherlock admittedly, unusually famished. John found he could get Sherlock to eat toast, as long as it was spackled with a dash of unsalted butter and a heavy, thick spread of marmalade. When Sherlock would eat nothing else, he would eat marmalade, as long as it was John that put it in front of him. He would eat marmalade, for John. And now John is stuck, finding himself staring at the cheerful, many coloured jam jars and wondering if he will ever eat marmalade again. The thought saddens him and before he can think on it, he has placed seventeen different tiny jars into his buggy.
When he gets home—when he gets back to the flat, he lines up the jars, one by one along the worktop and stares. They remain there for two whole days until Mrs. Hudson finally packs them away into the cupboards, shaking her head and avoiding John’s eyes.
But John isn’t looking at the marmalade. He isn’t looking at Mrs. Hudson. John sitting in his chair, bare feet steepled together in supplication, and waiting for Sherlock to come home. It is absolutely impossible that Sherlock is not here, firing off orders and demands and making John’s life a hectic mess. The flat is too quiet and the dull green leather of the well-worn armchair stares back at John in mocking stoicism.
The memorial service is torture. Seated in the front row on an overly hard plastic chair, John finds himself in between Mrs. Hudson and Harry, one woman quietly snuffling into an ancient handkerchief and one stoically silent and radiating disapproval. He knows he’s expected to speak, but his tongue has fused itself to the roof of his mouth and his vocal chords have not worked properly in days. How can he possibly voice the torrent of thoughts and images in his head? The snatches of memories and conversations, of spectacular, vitriolic rows and incredibly breathtaking sex, of finally living again in this grey world where nothing matters but the pinpoint, incendiary vision of perfect genius before him.
Half the Yard is standing silent at the back of the room and only half of them look remotely interested in the proceedings. Anderson stands, unnaturally close to Donovan and looking more shell-shocked than he has any right. John knows it’s petty and ridiculous, but he wishes Anderson had the decency to at least show what he’s actually feeling: triumph and acuity. This pretense of feelings, of sympathy is more jarring than Sally Donovan’s thinly veiled contempt. It is only Mrs. Hudson’s trembling hand on his arm that stops him violently breaking Donovan into tiny pieces during Greg’s speech, but at least her reaction is more real than the rest of them.
John stoutly avoids Mycroft. He also avoids Molly, who still reminds him of the lingering scent of expensive shampoo and damp curls. He sees something in her eyes that reflects his own pain, and he can’t bear to face that particular set of demons. Not yet. Not here, with Mrs. Hudson clinging to him like an autumn leaf desperately holding on to a tree. Not with the burial tomorrow. Not with his life in tatters, miserable and hollow in the foreseeable future.
He’s never felt like this. Grief is too small a word, too incomprehensible for the venomous tide of pain radiating through his flesh. He hates Sherlock, just as much as he loves him. He hates that he took the easy way out, leaving John to clean up his messes and apologize for his actions yet again in a world that will never understand his genius. In a world that will always use him and spite him for his help. A world that will not mourn him, that will believe it was all a lie, that his life was a lie. That John is a lie.
Harry takes him home, refusing to hear his protests and objections. Refusing to let him stay, wrapped up in the warm confines of madness within the silent walls of 221B. He sleeps in Harry’s spare bed, body finally succumbing to exhaustion. He doesn’t tell her he woke up with Sherlock’s tongue in his mouth this morning, with his hands laced into dark curls and his body wrapped around long limbs. He doesn’t tell her he sees Sherlock, solid and immovable, sitting on her sofa when they walk out her front door. He doesn’t tell her that Sherlock is staring at him in the reflection of her car windows, sitting just on the other side of John, deducing with his pale eyes and maddening smirk all the implications that shine through the rough and slightly cracked interior.
John knows it’s impossible, knows Sherlock is not there, but his presence is comforting in a way that should alarm him. He sees with absolute clarity all the tiny details that make up this marvelous man, more real to him than anything else in the world.
He can barely remember to keep his composure as he stands at the impossibly black and sleek grave. Sherlock would have a posh tombstone, the poncy git. John feels an absurd laugh bubble up his chest and wonders if he’s going slowly mad, or if he’s already pitched into the fray headfirst and unarmed.
There are far fewer people here today. Greg is here and Mike Stamford, along with Molly and Mycroft and Mrs. Hudson and a few of the random Homeless Network who could find a decently washed change of clothes. He recognizes one or two of them, nodding politely at him as they stand around the open maw of earth with the simple mahogany coffin hovering over it, a bouquet of white roses strewn across the top like paint splatters in a pool. He watches, limbs limp and languid at his sides as Mrs. Hudson places another rose over the top, kisses the tips of her fingers and brushes them along the wood. Mycroft wraps his hand around her elbow and leads her away after he places his own flower alongside hers, murmuring whothefuck knows what. Gentle platitudes, empty promises, sycophantic nonsense. Molly's hand rests gently on his shoulder for a moment before she moves past him, tears sliding steadily down her cheeks. Greg claps his hand to John's bicep and nods once, lips pressed together tightly and averting his eyes. His cheeks are suspiciously red and there's a tremor in his step that John has never noticed before.
He's not sure how long he stands there, staring at the dark wood and gaping earth before he carefully sets his own white rose among the others, leans down to run his fingers through damp and cold soil and tosses the first few grains onto the coffin.
He insists on staying until the grave is lowered, cranks creaking and whining in protest at their heavy burden. He watches and he feels and he wants and he takes and he loves and he needs and he cries. He stands there, staring at the slightly raised brown patch of earth, wishing not for the first time, that it was himself layered under the comforting silence of wood and stone.
Mrs. Hudson returns to him after what feels like a lifetime, tucking her hand into his elbow and leaning her head against his arm. They are the only two left now. He forces himself to speak, hoping for a sympathetic tone and knowing he's falling flat.
"I'm angry," he confesses, but that's only one facet of this endless game of Russian roulette. She doesn't need to know the depth of his grief, of his love.
“It’s okay, John. There’s nothing unusual in that. That’s the way he made everyone feel. All the marks on my table, and the noise –firing guns at half past one in the morning! Bloody specimens in my fridge! Imagine, keeping bodies where there’s food!”
“Yes.” It’s all John can think of as a reply. Everything Mrs. Hudson is saying is absolutely true, but that’s not why John is angry. He is angry because Sherlock left him here, all alone with nobody to chase after, no danger except in his own mind.
“And the fighting! Drove me up the wall with all his carryings-on!”
“Yeah, listen, I’m not actually that angry, okay?” He can’t listen to this anymore. Little reminders of all of Sherlock’s many nuisances, his idiosyncrasies, the things other people found irritating and impossible and which John found charming and endearing. Of course he’s angry, but not for the reasons everyone thinks.
“Okay,” she sighs and snuffles into her revolting handkerchief. “I’ll leave you alone to, erm… you know.”
When he is alone again, he feels Sherlock's presence, almost tangible in the air. The phantom images of him are getting sharper in their focus, and yet he seems so far away, barely visible in the line of trees. John doesn't look, can't look at the ghost of his friend now. There are too many things he needs to say and if he looks, if he sees the impossible again, he won't be able to continue. He takes a deep breath and tries for calm.
“You… you told me once that you weren’t a hero. And… there were times I didn’t even think you were human, but let me tell you this: you were the best man, and the most human… human being that I’ve ever known and no one will ever convince me that you told me a lie, and so… there.”
He has to swallow back the tide of emotions that seems to ebb and flow with his thoughts. Clearing his throat, he tries one more time, “I was so alone, and I owe you so much.” He touches his shaking hand to the black marble, feeling the frigid and hard stone beneath his fingertips, grounding him to reality. He feels the cold creeping in, seeping down into his very bones.
He barely lets it slip, his one final request. It slides past his lips, tangling on his tongue and catching on the ragged edges of his teeth before he can stop it. “No, please, there’s just one more thing, mate, one more thing: one more miracle, Sherlock. For me. Don’t... be... dead. Would you…? Just for me, just stop it. Stop this.” The words make his head spin, the ache in his chest radiating through his veins as he allows himself to crumble, just a little. Just for a moment. Just until he can breathe without his throat closing up and his eyes watering.
And just then, when he turns to leave, scattering all the leftover pieces of his shattered heart over rough-tilled earth, he feels it: a penetrating gaze, sweeping his form with remarkable accuracy, assessing and acknowledging all his shortcomings and emotions and dismissing them just as easily. He smells a faint whiff of overpriced aftershave on the wind, but he doesn’t turn around. He knows it’s just a trick of his mind, of the madness taking over his senses.
Closing his eyes against the fresh swell of tears, he wills himself into stillness. Walking away is the hardest thing he'll ever do and he's not confident he'll survive. Doctor and soldier, friend and blogger, flat mate and lover. Boring and useless John Watson.
Goodbye, my love. He doesn't say it. He will never say it.
Taking a deep breath, he wrenches his feet from the ground, forcing his legs into movement and limping slightly when his leg trembles beneath him.
And he walks away.
And come morning, I am disappeared
Just an imprint on the bed sheets
~I am Disappeared, Frank Turner