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“That doesn’t explain anything – why would she kill him here of all places?” Anderson squawks. “Statistically, crimes of passion happen in the bedroom or the kitchen, areas of shared domesticity –”
Sherlock raises an eyebrow. “Somebody’s trying.” His lips twitch. “Too bad that your efforts are so misguided. Bedrooms and kitchens are locales of proximity, physical representations of a shared life. That is the reason that stabbings, stranglings, and gunfire happen in such a domestic setting when two people fall apart. That’s also the reason why she killed him, here, in this of all places.”
He lifts his hands and turns slowly, putting the great empty room on display.
The polished wooden floors gleam – except where blood has pooled, congealing and drying at the edges. Tape and chalk mar the soft shine left behind by hundreds of pairs of left feet learning. Large windows drench the room in rare sunlight, a wall comprised of mirror multiplies it, bouncing light to its twin and back and forth and back and forth.
They are surrounded by a compound crime scene, countless consulting detectives berating countless crime scene investigators.
An infinity of Lestrades raise their hands. “Settle down lads.” His faces and eyes tip towards John’s.
John, just off the edge of the floor, as if reluctant to stand on the studio flooring, is singular, beyond the multiplying effect of the mirrors. “Sherlock?” he says. The effect is instantaneous – at once the detective is focused on the lone doctor.
“They were partners,” Sherlock launches forward in explanation, “on and off the floor. Husband and wife wasn’t the most important label in their life together – it was the bond of a lifetime of dancing, career performances, exhibitions…” Sherlock trails off, turning again, his eyes searching and snagging, stuttering as they took in details: scuff marks in the corners, hand prints against the mirrors, the distant cork board with performance fliers. He smiles, but it isn’t the vicious victory smile John has grown to expect. Softness lurks at the edges.
“She was injured, shackled by a deteriorating knee. He was still prime for the center stage. He wanted to go solo, or secure a new partner. Leave her behind, limping, never to catch up.” He looks off into the reflected myriad, numberless red stains curving away from that one and fatal decision. “She wanted them together – always.” It is not a sneer when he says, “Partner dances, after all. Better with a partner.”
“Well. Killing him is a strange way of ensuring they never part,” Lestrade murmurs. “She’ll be all on her own, now –” but Sherlock is shaking his head. His eyes stare out the window.
“She didn’t want her body found, broken like this – that would have been a feeling she was all too familiar with by the end, I believe. But their shared office has a view of the river. That would be a good place to start looking.”
John grimaces as the DI calls out the order for a river search. Sherlock walks up, joining John at the edge, his feet staying on the planking until the last second.
John wonders about that, in that moment, but then Sherlock is slipping past him, not waiting for glowing praise or half-hearted reprimands. John shakes his head and follows.
There is no post-case triumph, this time. No celebratory dinner or tension-release laughter.
The harsh lines of the detective do not blur into the pliant curves of John’s flatmate and friend. Instead there is a slump to his shoulders, a glaze to his eyes.
John has finished his solitary takeout when he asks, “Did you know him? Or her?” Because the last time Sherlock was something resembling this affected, it had to do with the Woman.
“Hmm?”
“You knew them.” John had been thinking of writing up the case for the blog – ‘Blood on the Dance Floor’ had seemed an appropriate title. Now, he thinks he’ll give this one a miss.
“Of course not.” There should be vitriol in those words, a viper strike of disdain in that voice, but there isn’t. Sherlock settles the violin flush to his chin and cheek and pale neck. Unlike that time with the Woman, there’s no vacancy to be filled with dirges and diatribes.
John watches the man he thought he knew stand and forget to play the instrument perched on his shoulder, bow poised in his supple grip.
“Well, something’s wrong,” John declares.
Sherlock sighs and begins to play, the notes sliding off the strings in threes, slow, soft, somber like the man coaxing them into existence. The word ‘wistful’ comes to mind.
John doesn’t know what to do with this new version of Sherlock, but he feels the music and knows its worth, and says, “That’s beautiful,” because it is, and because Sherlock always responds well to compliments. Because he likes complimenting Sherlock.
The music sways and Sherlock’s shoulders sway and even John is swaying, a little, to its lull, and when Sherlock glances up at John, acknowledging the compliment, John can taste the lingering humidity of the evening heat, smothering honey in his throat, and Sherlock’s lips quirk the smallest of smiles, all soft curves and appreciation.
These are things that are never voiced, but the music lists from side to side, and while Sherlock doesn’t say a word that night, the night waltzes on all the same.
“Sherlock? You still here? Appointment cancelled, so if you need –” John stops dead in his tracks. Nothing could have prepared him for the scene before him:
Their living room has become a cleared space: sofa pushed back, chairs huddled in opposite corners, table and detritus shoved to the walls, rug rolled up and tucked almost into the fireplace. The floor, planks normally dusty, is clear and clean and completely open.
This is not the first time John has seen the floor cleared like this, although usually there is a chalk line form or a series of photographs of footprints or blood spatter laid out, precise and methodical.
This is not the first time he’s seen Sherlock standing in the middle of it all, a lord surveying his lands, a general inspecting his troops, completely in control of the space.
It is the first time that the reverse is true.
Sure feet, soft steps carry the detective around the circumference of the space, and even though his eyes are closed, brow furrowed as though playing a particularly vigorous flourish on the Strad, some innate sense guides him away from the tripping edges of the room’s detritus. Every movement is supple, the flex and fold of joints as –
John doesn’t realize he’s dropped his mobile until the entrancing motion before him stills.
Sherlock is frozen – surprised, no doubt, caught unawares by John’s abrupt return. He is frozen with his arms extended (graceful like the rest of him) to cradle an invisible other, left arm raised, right arm curved lower.
Slowly, the rigor in his muscles lifts, and his arms lower to rest at his sides. “John.” He’s facing away from the doctor’s poleaxed stare, and that allows John a moment to collect himself, to inhale against the tightness in his chest. “I – ”
“You dance.” For a moment, John searches for a quip to lance the tension from the room, but no. This is…something new. It doesn’t even occur to him that it might be for a case – if it were, Sherlock would have forced John to careen about so that the detective could observe. And his eyes would have been open, not shut in reverie. “Since when?”
Sherlock turns and eyes John, careful, and John is used to being read by now, but he’s not used to being feared. Not by Sherlock.
“Since I was younger.” Again, that testing glare, a challenge to accompany that non-answer.
“That’s. Umm. Ok, right – fine.” John shuts his mouth before it can continue to spew nonsense.
Sherlock lifts a brow.
“Why did you stop?”
The detective rolls his eyes. “As is evidenced by this charming little tableau, I didn’t –”
John shakes his head, “No – I mean – you never talk about this. You never do this. And from what I just saw, this was – is – it matters to you. And it’s never come up. You warned me about the violin and not talking – but this, this you kept hidden.” Frost creeps into Sherlock’s eyes with each word, hardness into his limbs, and John knows he should stop pushing, but he doesn’t. “What happened?”
Suddenly, Sherlock is in his face, looming, having demolished the distance between them with that unexpected speed and unlooked-for grace. “Why do you want to know?”
“Because it matters to me whether you’re happy or not.” The sentence drops unplanned from John’s lips, but he wouldn’t change it if he could. It is true.
“What? Why?”
“Because I’m your friend, you git.” Also truth, if perhaps not the whole of it.
Sherlock looms closer, his body pressing forward, every angle of him aggressive, and John finds himself stepping back once, twice – and Sherlock pauses. “Imagine,” he says, and as he does, he lifts his left hand and clasps John’s right shoulder, “being good at something.” John twitches as the other hand grips his waist, just under the ribcage.
Now, as Sherlock takes a sliding step forward, his foot skimming between John’s legs, the pressure of his advance and his hands guides John backwards, maintaining the scant distance between them, rigid yet expressive. He wants to ask why this is happening, how this is meant to go, but Sherlock’s motion and mood hold him captive and mute.
“Imagine,” the detective continues in a dark baritone, “being close enough to achieve a version of perfection. Of having it within reach – only to have it taken away.”
John doesn’t have to imagine, and he doesn’t have to tell Sherlock.
They’ve completed a turn of the room, now, and Sherlock is picking up speed, his steps measured out in threes, and somehow they’re turning, and John is dizzy with it and something else entirely. “How – why?” he asks, his breath a tightness in his throat.
“Partner dances,” Sherlock spits out, “require a partner.”
Oh.
“Not your area?” John asks before he can stop himself. Worse than the intimacy of touch (and now John is rethinking the few times he’s seen Sherlock initiate physical contact with anyone), the intimacy of trust must have been an impossible hurdle. Whatever hurt Sherlock, it wasn’t dance – whoever hurt Sherlock did so long before the result ruined his chances at perfection. At a partner.
Just as suddenly as it started, it stops. The room no longer spins about them. Sherlock’s hands depart his flesh. John is queasy with the sudden difference of it all.
When the room stops spinning, Sherlock is gone, his coat is gone, his mobile is on the kitchen table, and it doesn’t take a consulting detective to deduce he has gone out and doesn’t want to talk.
John flops to the ground with a sigh and waits for the feeling of falling to fade.
Two days pass in uncomfortable distance. The living room floor remains a crime scene, undisturbed, awaiting autopsy.
Sherlock is busy with experiments and long thoughts and silent violin concertos. John wonders if he took up the violin after dance failed him, or if he had always played it, loved it, trusted it. The Strad could be the perfect partner, after all, where another person never would.
John aches with that thought, for the mad man staring out of the window, fingers picking out an un-bowed tune from the strings of his oldest companion.
John goes on a date, but comes home early, retreats to his bedroom early, alone. He’s frustrated and unaccountably exhausted yet still unable to sleep. With a resigned huff, he reaches down, works himself to hardness and completion. His thoughts are sour with the evening wasted, with the abnormal quiet of the flat, the ringing silence between himself and Sherlock.
Sleep, among other things, is elusive and unsatisfying.
The next day is spent in uncomfortable proximity. Getting shoved into a meat-locker full of half-cannibalized corpses will dissolve just about any personal space issues (domestic spats included) it seems.
The screen on John’s mobile (Sherlock’s had been lost in the chase, somehow) is cracked and dark, but Sherlock taps out a sequence of touches against its buttons all the same, (hopefully) sending a text.
As they wait for the Met to arrive, uncertain if they will (in time or at all), they sit shoulder to shoulder. They are both shivering uncontrollably, but John eventually manages to weave his shaking arm through Sherlock’s. He links their trembling hands. Sherlock glances at him, puzzled but not disdainful.
“Sorry we’re in this mess.” It’s a struggle to form words.
“Not your fault,” Sherlock chatters out. “Mine.”
John coughs a laugh. Shivers for a bit. “I had never. You know.” Sherlock is silent. “Danced.” John shudders around the next words. “Perfectly or. You know. Otherwise.” The cold is getting in the way of thought, interrupting John before he even speaks.
“Otherwise?” Sherlock’s teeth bite the question into syllables.
“For fun. You know.” He hopes any of this makes sense.
Sherlock is silent for a while. Then he snorts. “You still haven’t.” His breath clouds the air again and again. John rolls his eyes, although he supposes being aggressively steered about the living room floor hadn’t really counted.
“It…” Sherlock clears his throat, “the dancing. It was the closest I ever came to being part of something. Something more.” John can hear the frown in that voice, wonders when last Sherlock examined of that part of his life. John’s more pragmatic side busies itself worrying about the candid revelations of his friend – the chance of being found in time must not be good.
His eyes and thoughts catch on the corpse of a young man, suspended from a meat hook, blue skin and purple tears in the flesh, and he shakes his head, clouded with cold. “Should’ve…stopped this…happening.”
Sherlock huffs in response and shifts closer.
The Met gets there in time – barely. Greg is a (livid) wreck. The paramedics are overbearing.
The floor is still empty when they return to 221B. The night air is warm and damp, like brazen hands against skin so recently chilled. They both stare at the empty space for a moment, then part and go to their separate rooms.
It’s a mark of how exhausted John still is (still recuperating) when he stumbles into the living room the next day after 3 pm. He makes his way blearily to the bathroom, avails himself of running water and its various charms, then emerges, redressed in his sleepwear but slightly more awake.
John startles the rest of the way to wakefulness when he spots Sherlock standing in the middle of the floor, in a ratty t-shirt and his blue robe. His bare toes peek out from under the soft grey fabric of his pajama bottoms. His hair is disheveled, curls in disarray. John would like to think, would hope, that it means his friend has slept, but he knows better. He knows the pattern and the chaos of hair raked by restless fingers.
Something has kept Sherlock awake. Something that had him thinking and thinking and overthinking – and he never woke John with a text or a demand or an errand to run.
“Sherlock?”
Sherlock’s eyes snap to focus on John’s. He takes a breath, shoulders visibly shifting, then steps forward with measured steps, the placement of each one methodical, precise. His hand extends, and John’s hand lifts toward it, just a bit, without his say-so. Sherlock’s fingers breach the gap to enfold John’s.
“Sherlock what is this –?” but then it’s too late, and Sherlock’s hand has engulfed his, and every atom of John’s body is being tugged into orbit by every fibre of Sherlock’s.
Sherlock positions their joined hands, and this time John doesn’t jump when a warm palm settles against his waist. Somehow, the confused steps John’s feet have taken become a coordinated intertwining, John moving backwards, Sherlock’s feet brushing between his, the space between each molecule of each other defined by a twisting smoothness, a rhythmic cadence:
Slow, slow, quick quick, slow.
As the movements of John’s feet grow more certain, Sherlock’s hand travels up from his waist to lie along the curve of his shoulder blade. Gentle pressure torques their bodies, then unwinds them into a powerful turn.
Sherlock’s knee presses softly against John’s thigh, and his feet never falter. His hands are warm and dry and firm where they keep contact with John – a dialogue of skin and pressure, push and pull, whispered through touches.
Sherlock steps light and fancy to the side, and John waivers, but a soft pull brings him along, feet playing catch-up. “Tango,” Sherlock says, “to answer your earlier question.” He steps back, only connected through their joined hands, and walks around John, measured paces, pivoting John on the spot, who lets him. John has a brief moment to fret over what that says, and then Sherlock is interrupting his thoughts: “Stop worrying.”
He’s closer again, his right hand homing in on John’s waist, sliding up to find his shoulder blade, then continuing the sensual journey, bringing John’s suddenly nervous left arm up. “It was once tradition for men to dance the tango together,” he murmurs, slipping his arm under, buoying John’s up, settling the doctor’s hand along the line of the detective’s bicep. “To learn and also to pass the time while waiting for rooms to free up at bordellos.”
John flushes at that, at the thought of being anxious for touch, of turning to another man, letting limbs tangle and bodies move rhythmically…
Sherlock slips his arm back to its original roost, his hand skimming along the underside of John’s arm to land on his back, perch feather light on his shoulder blade, splay to guide and caress –
John trips, tips forward, and Sherlock guides their sudden momentum into a twist, bending one knee while the other trails out straight. John ends up in a sort of improvised dip, looking up at Sherlock, who looks down at him, superior and teasing, but there’s a smile in his eyes that has nothing to do with being better.
It takes John’s breath away, and then it’s gone, and the world rights itself as Sherlock guides them up again. Saving face means saying something, and John finds himself grumbling, “This would be easier with music.”
Sherlock laughs, just once. “I forgot.”
“Forgot what?” They’re moving again, and talking while dancing is difficult, but this seems important.
“Not everyone hears it.”
Oh.
“Umm. Sorry I suppose. If I’m not listening right. Or moving right.” He grimaces. “Perfection, and all that.” He can’t meet Sherlock’s eyes. This whole time they’ve been weaving this – this thing, moment or whatever, and he can’t even look Sherlock in the face –
Sherlock stops moving, but doesn’t step away. “John.”
John manages to nerve up, to look up. They seem a lot closer than before, although he’s certain neither of them has moved.
“Yesterday was… a very close call.” Sherlock’s voice is a shade above a whisper.
John’s reply catches in his throat. “It was.”
There’s a subtle sway in their bodies, and John feels lulled by it. Warmed by it. He shivers, just once, as Sherlock’s palm shifts down from scapula to sacrum. John wonders, worries that it’s some subtle signal for how to move next, and his brain is hitching on the touch itself rather than what it might convey, and –
“I don’t know what to do. Never done this before, remember?” John manages. “And I thought you didn’t do this.”
Sherlock quirks an eyebrow. “I stopped dancing because I couldn’t find a partner I’d tolerate. Who’d tolerate me.” He tilts his head. “That was a long time ago.” His hands still for a moment. He looks away, swallows. “And you needn’t worry – you’re very intuitive.” He clears his throat. “Wonderfully so.”
Well.
Sherlock’s fingers squeeze John’s, just once. “Alright?” he asks, softly. John wonders what he’s asking, really. Is it permission? His heart is already kicking into high gear, his skin glowing where Sherlock’s scant touches trailed what seems like ages ago. Bright lines of light trickle from those points to pool in the deeper recesses of his body.
John, very cautiously, squeezes back, just once, a brief flex of fingers.
When they move again, it’s because Sherlock’s leg has slid between John’s, has slipped up along his thigh, is nearly pushing up against –
But then it’s time for the next step, and the next, and the next, and it’s an oscillating torture of almost too much and nowhere near enough, and John is breathless with something warm and tight, and he is not going to question it, not now, not when Sherlock is leaning forward, is focused completely on him, on them.
Turns happen, pauses are negotiated, and Sherlock’s hands (and intermittent thigh) are coals against John’s palm and waist and Sartorius line, and then Sherlock stops.
“What happened?” John ventures.
“The music stopped.” Dark eyes rake across John’s features. He can almost feel that gaze against his throat, his lips, his eyes.
“Oh.” John wonders if he should untangle himself, but Sherlock makes no move to remove his hands or shift his thigh away from where it presses insistently. Instead, Sherlock leans in, and John watches it happen, watches himself let it happen. He knows he threw the towel in long ago, but somehow he’s only realizing he did that now.
Firm lips just brush his, sweeping from corner to enter, and despite all the realizations in the world, John still feels his body stiffen in surprise, and then those lips are pulling away, and John knows if he lets them, he’ll never get them back.
John’s left hand surges up to tangle in Sherlock’s hair, to prevent retreat, and then he’s crushed their mouths together, trying to erase the stillness of shock from the memory of his lips, from Sherlock’s lips, and somewhere in that crush a moan escapes Sherlock.
That sound burns down John’s throat and into his belly, fanning the coals that have been banked by tango and touch. Before he knows it, his tongue is swiping along Sherlock’s lower lip, dipping in past those moan-opened gates to taste the pink of Sherlock’s mouth.
John becomes aware of the wall at his back, of Sherlock’s right hand clutching where his head and neck meet, and their right and left hands are still locked in a dancer’s join, and their mouths are wet and flushed against each other. Sherlock’s hips have met John’s now, jockeying for position, fighting his thigh’s territorial claim.
Someone is making a high-pitched sound, like panting mixed with a hormone crazed whine, and John hopes it’s not him, because that might be a touch embarrassing later when this ends and everyone comes to their senses and oh god –
Sherlock pulls away. “Stop.” His voice is hoarse. Harsh.
John shudders at that word and what it means.
Sherlock swallows, and this time says, “Stop worrying, John.”
Oh. Oh.
Something inside John shakes apart. “Oh god, Sherlock,” he manages, and then their breaths are mingled once more, humid and hot and uneven, and their hands redouble their efforts – John has both his hands in Sherlock’s hair now, and how long has that wanted to happen (later, worry about it later), and Sherlock has one arm curled around John’s neck and shoulders, and the other has slipped down to curve across his back, claiming, claiming, keeping –
Things are happening before John realizes, like Sherlock’s mouth against his throat, marking his neck, sucking on his earlobe, like Sherlock’s hips pushing rhythmically against his, slow, slow, like John’s hips pushing back, quick, quick, like his breath coming in ragged snatches –
His body tightens, curls up into Sherlock’s hold, pushing close, and John keens, “Sherlock,” through his tight throat and clenched jaws, and then he’s coming, a flood of sensation unspooling the cords of his muscles, wilting the iron of his spine, and god, how embarrassing to come so fast and from so little, except for the way Sherlock is looking at him: mouth open in shock, lips flushed and softened by John’s mouth, colour smudging the alabaster of his cheekbones a feverish rose, eyes unblinking, pupils blown wide and dark, bottomless.
John shivers, nerves afire, and the moment snaps, and Sherlock surges in to kiss again, an unending assault against John’s skin and mouth and tongue; John retaliates with one strategic hand, and Sherlock’s entire frame judders like a ship run to ground, and it sounds like a choked sob, but it’s John’s name –
The strangled sound that escapes directly after is oil on a fire, and John recaptures Sherlock’s gasping mouth in a deep kiss.
The steel leaves Sherlock’s arms and legs, and they sink to the floor, boneless, graceless (even Sherlock), sweaty, a right mess of limbs and evidence.
“Better with a partner, hey?” John manages, and then giggles, and Sherlock snorts and joins in for a moment, but they’re both still out of breath, reeling with what just happened. And that’s alright. John looks down to where Sherlock’s collapsed against him. He realizes their hands are joined again, and he doesn’t know who initiated, but that doesn’t matter right now. Maybe he’ll worry about it later. Maybe.
For now, everything is a version of perfect.