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He doesn't mind a Saturday shift at the clinic, really.
After all, it means he'll come home to a freshly tidied flat, dishes washed and back in their proper place, parlor neat as a pin. Because that's what normal people do of a weekend, they tidy. And surely his flatmate is, at this very moment, cleaning up after himself like a human being would.
He could laugh or he could cry. Call it a draw; with a fond half-smile and a resigned sigh, he flips the last chart closed and heads for home. And Holmes.
*
Ah yes, the dirty cups all still scattered where they were when he left this morning. All still where they were when he left yesterday morning, point of fact. The "Busy afternoon?" he lobs into the cozy quiet of the flat gets him a sort of mild grunt from the vicinity of the kitchen table, where there's faint clanking and whirring - and the occasional bit of soft humming Sherlock vehemently denies he sometimes does when he's lost in thought "I do not get lost in thought" - but, thankfully, no fearsome smells, and nothing severed lying 'round.
“Any sausage rolls lef--”
There's only silence to catch his fall, as Sherlock, having not noticed he was speaking, likewise does not notice that he's halted.
Tingling in the arm. Heart attack, then. Oh. No, it's his right arm that's tingling. Or both. Because there it is, right there on the coffee table. Unmistakable, even from where he's standing.
Why is his private- his (ohdeargod) extremely private- reading material sitting in the parlor?
And why- why is it crisscrossed with a maze of yellow streaks and furious patches of cursive that look more like Aztec glyphs than proper handwriting?
Fortunately, this is not actually happening. He's fallen asleep at his desk. Still at work. Just a dream.
He'll wake up shortly, dab the bit of drool away and. And.
One doesn't actually sputter, of course. Sputtering only happens in films. He sputters.
"What- What is this?!"
"I've made the necessary corrections." Without even looking up. Dismissive; infuriating; in sum, Sherlock.
Anger battling with plain agog for dominance, he only just manages proper interrogative. "How did you- Why were you even- Why were you in my room?"
"I needed more paper. We were out of paper again . Honestly John, it's as though you completely ignore the shop lists that I-
"You riffled through my desk?!"
"Yes, do catch up, won't you? We're past that bit now." Brush of silk just against him as Sherlock glides by en route to the offending document. "What's important is this- this madness. Just look, here-"
He can't, of course, as Sherlock's snatched the sheaf off the coffee table and is brandishing it upwards in an angry shake as if the ceiling were an avenging deity who would obligingly smite it.
"A 'weeping' cock! A weeping cock, John. It's patently absurd. The human penis does not 'weep'. It produces Cowper's fluid in the amount of approximately .0002 drams - at best. In what possible world is that weeping?
Breath unnecessary when he rides this kind of wave, he barrels on without stopping, "..apparently the same world in which the contraction 'You are coming' has been revised to 'Your coming' and the word 'lose' no longer exists: 'I'm going to make you loose control'. It's as though primary education has simply vanished from the face of the earth."
The great despair of the malapropism epidemic slows him temporarily, frown tugging at his mouth before he gets his second wind, clambering over the ottoman with impunity so he can shove the mass of paper under John's nose as he continues.
"But this- see where I've-- yes, there where it's circled- this is the worst of it. You cannot induce an orgasm in a human subject just by doing that."
Quite a bit more of the speeding discursive train, on and on about nerve endings and vascular this and that, enthused variations on "simply outrageous, the offense to anatomical fact!", all accompanied by dramatic gesticulations that Marcel Marceau would envy.
John just waits, lets him wind down like a spin toy madly spending off its kinetic energy until finally he flops down with a theatrical huff in the chair opposite where John's still standing. Still standing, but suddenly not as sturdily; there's a tingle up his back. And why do his legs feel just a little wobbly? He'll venture this reply, why shouldn't he? After all, it's just a semantic discussion.
"Well, actually- it's not."
"What's not what?" Eyebrows quirked as though John's suddenly lapsed into an unknown Aramaic dialect.
"That part's- not wrong. A person can, erm. You know. Just from having that done to them."
Thick jam on the toast that is the room, this silence. Oozing down over the edges of them.
Sherlock presses a slender fingertip against his lip in the contemplative tic that most definitely doesn’t make something warm kindle low in John’s belly every time he sees it. Ah, the verdict is in: "I don't see how it's possible. Therefore it must not be possible."
"Well. Nevertheless, it um... it is."
He'd have thought by now that nothing could surprise him coming from Sherlock's mouth, having witnessed - and been on the receiving end of - all manner of brusque, frank declarations, demands; things no normal person would ever say. He'd have thought that, and been bloody wrong.
"Show me."
Ah, so this is how the word "gobsmacked" was invented. There's a high-pitched noise in his ears. Sit, then. Yes, just the thing. The creak of the chair reminds him to breathe. Also a good decision. Breathing is. Good.
The petulant face swims back into clearer view. No sign of flirtation or arousal. Just the usual imperious visage, staring unblinking at him as though he were a cretin incapable of saying anything clever.
"Um-"
Clever, John. Good show. The shift of loose curl as Sherlock tilts his head impatiently for the rest of the sentence makes his mouth go suddenly dry.
"We can't just- I mean, it's- I-" It's this damned vise he's caught it, squeezed between the impulse to laugh raucously at the sheer absurdity and the sudden flare of desire two tiny words sent crashing through his guts. It's catching his words in its pinch.
"Look, if you don't want to assist me-"
Barking mad, is what it is. Dafter than a dog in a hat. Something he'd have to be absolutely insane to even consider doing. So he'll do it, then?
It would seem so; else, why did his hand dart out and lay itself on the bony knee that was preparing to bend and stand and walk away? It feels warm under his palm, solid. Impossible to say if the quiver's in his hand or the leg it's touching. Touching and not pulling back.
Sherlock no doubt thinks that only he himself is keen enough an observer to notice the small shift that runs suddenly under the expression on his own face. The blinkered eyes of pride, blocking the view: John has in fact picked up a bit of his skill. Sees the current there. It makes him forget that thing he was supposed to remember. Something about lungs moving, he doesn't know, doesn't care, because this, this- look has flashed across Sherlock's face and suddenly the room is engulfed in flames and there's a bit of red creeping slowly up the pointy hill of white cheekbone and, and- He's going to. They're going to.
How on earth are they going to? This temperamental creature. Unpredictable, tense as a deer at the forest edge. Keep to his comfort zone. Keep to the science. He's been to war, surely he can do this. Confident throat-clearing. Not at all nervous sounding throat-clearing. "Right then. So. Would you like to now, or-"
"Now."
Of course. "We should probably um- find a suitable location to do the ah.. data collecting."
"Not in here?"
Oh god, is he really going to? It's not swirly hysteria tugging at the edges of his mind, no. It's just- "No, I think the uh- the um." Point, you great blathering git. There we are. Index finger in the general direction of the bedroom. Well done.
Before he can even begin to think the next move, he's watching the flare of robe swirl out of the parlor, bare feet thumping the stairs with quick precision. This is. Something he'd better not stop to think about. Besides, he needs all his concentration just to stand up out of the chair. Shoes on the stairs less quick, less precise. Small rhythm of the limp a quiet melody that doesn't bother him at this moment. The late afternoon light slanting through the open door silently waits for him to step inside. Hand on the knob. Not to steady himself. Just to.. steady himself, right.
Sherlock's lost something on the landing, or the stairs. His confidence having fallen off like a loose button, rolled unseen into a crevasse between floorboards. Gone is the brisk, gone the brusque. He's just standing there next to the bed like some gawky "Before" version of Michelangelo's David, one hand curled anxiously in on itself, hanging against his thigh, head turned, gazing at nothing. He looks- Oh damn. He looks scared.
As in the tumult of war, John's only got instinct here, and he follows it into this other terra incognita; steps slowly into him, stretches up and presses a light kiss to his jaw. Gets a rapid exhale that sounds a lot like relief, and that's good. Oh- Oh, the gangly arms suddenly around him are even better. Chin against his head, and he feels as much as hears the awkward swallow that precedes the tentative sentence.
"I don't exactly- I'm not well acquainted with... I.."
Not sure whether rubbing the small circle against Sherlock's back is meant to comfort him or soothe the little knifepoint of sympathy that shot through his own rib, but in either case, it's working. "Shh. You don't have to do anything, just... 'observe the experiment', 'kay?"
The little smile in his voice isn't lost on the world's greatest detective, who smiles a jot too, relaxes. Easy now that he's more pliable to push him gently onto the bed, get him out of the ubiquitous blue bathrobe- sorry, sorry,"dressing gown". Suddenly wants to kiss that forehead, so he does. Just as addictive as he'd imagined. One more then, and a slow slide of his fingers through the raft of curls. Gets in return a sigh saturated with contentment; yes, this might just work. If he doesn't startle him, if he goes slowly, so he does.
Quiet lift of spine to slip him out of shirt; slow drift of lips as he kisses warmth onto the exposed skin, prickling with chill. Nipples tight and small, tiny seashells under his tongue. And has he ever heard a more shocked sound? One long leg flailing at the first lick, something like a bark out of the swannish throat. Unhinging already. Hard now to bite back his own urges. Moves down, nips flat belly, gently as he can, which isn't very. Watches the plush pink mouth fall open. Panting already. Christ. If Sherlock's this responsive, John might come just by doing it to him. What sort of variable is that in the hypothesis?
Perhaps the answer's under the band of the pyjama bottoms. Best to check. Quick work in the hands of a doctor, down and off over knobby ankles before Sherlock can protest, think, overthink, trounce it all up somehow. The tremulous syllable reaches his ears one beat before he hears the pants land softly on the floor.
"John."
Has no idea what it is in the tone of it that makes his heart contract painfully. Sherlock. Suddenly so out of his depth, suddenly so. Vulnerable. A glance up shows him something he thought he'd never see: Uncertainty. As naked and splayed to view on his face as his body is. Nothing for it but to answer. And sometimes answering means opening your mouth and wetly warming the head of a slim, curved cock, so he does.
Slowly, he thinks; the man’s unhinged already, don’t startle. Softly, the slick pull of suction up from the curl-flocked base to the leaky - how many .0 drams was it? - tip. Slowly, the slip of tongue under foreskin. Impossible, the idea of stopping, but this isn't what they're here for, is it?
Simultaneous growls of regret when he pulls away, Sherlock's edged with more agony, and he reaches, soothes. Stroke of calloused palm over hipbone, watches the heaving ribcage tide even out, just a little. Nudging hand under spine stirs the heavy eyelids open to reveal the stare: Wild, lost, thrilled. Contagious, apparently, as the look in Sherlock's eyes makes John sway on his knees, the mattress no help in the matter. Memory leaps forth from neurons: An overheard phrase floating in the din of rounds on the ward, a patient saying "dizzy in my stomach." Yes, exactly.
Does he say "Over." out loud? Perhaps he just thinks it and nudges but Sherlock's a genius, so he knows, can probably read his actual mind, and he rolls, compliantly, the groan into the pillow like some sort of lunatic lightning to John's trapped prick. Oh god. Did get that one out loud, evidently - Sherlock cranes his head around in alarm, or whatever alarm looks like on a dazed, sweating, naked detective.
What can he possibly say by way of explanation, of reassurance? You're just so- You make me feel so- ? Sometimes saying means opening your mouth and wetly warming the dusky cleft of a pale, perfect arse with your tongue.
So he does.
Was he expecting resistance, reticence, shyness? Probably, if he could think about it, if thinking were on the table. It isn't. And it's fine, so entirely fine, that Sherlock isn't squirming away in embarrassment, that instead he's. Actually pushing himself upward, body begging for more. John can give him more. Oh yes. Thumbs pressing, spreading. Tell me you want more, Sherlock, he thinks loudly at him, testing the telepathy theory. Tell me and I'll give it to you. Above him, a garbled please rises into the thick air like a note torn brutally from the violin. Not quite "I want more", but it'll suffice.
It's been- awhile- since he's done this- done anything, really, and for just a moment, he worries. Best thing for worrying is doing and so. He does.
Impossibly light lapping to start, barest flick of tonguepoint at the far edges, just this side of the border between smoothwhite and wrinkledpink. Slow slide down to perineum, and a firm press there- Oh. Gods. Yes, that. That's got him, a solid shake all over and an absolutely tortured moan. Slow slide up to coccyx. Lingers there, tracing wet laps in the bowl of spine while massaging the warm line where thigh meets buttock with his fingers. Surprising, somehow, how hot the pale skin is under his lips, under his fingertips. The involuntary Mmm that slips out as he savors the warmth gets him a staccato O h hh in return. Hunger. He remembers now. What it is to crave.
And crave he does, mouth flooding with want; wants to lick, wants to press inside. Supposed to be slowly. He tries to hold back, good on him. Little flitting licks; edge, center. Center causes a kick the first time, missing him by an inch, and an incomprehensible sound that he's sure was meant to be "Sorry". Best hold him, then, tighter grip on the lean white thighs for what comes next. Oh next.
Circling and circling, firmer and faster, pointed then flat and back again, long, lush minutes in which nothing exists but this endless licking, and when he starts rapidly fluttering dead center the now spasming ring of muscle, the litany begins. John. John. Like pure anguish poured into a word cup. Wet smear everywhere, glistening saliva on chin, thigh, dripping down curves and clefts; how utterly debauched this must look. The thought tightens his cock where it's trapped and makes his tongue suddenly untamable. He'd wanted to wait, go slowly, but there's no Wait anymore, no Slowly possible. One last torturous flicker across and then. In.
The world is still. Something's gone wrong. Silence everywhere, and some slow, dragging tilt to the axis of the earth. No. It's just that blur before the car crashes, before the just-landed grenade explodes, when we catch a glimpse outside of time. Before everything is very much not still and very much not silent. It's legitimately a scream; not a loud one, certainly, but undeniably a scream, and given their line of work, he hopes that a well-meaning neighbor doesn't ring the police. Not silent and not still either - the long body twisting suddenly in a fierce thrash that pulls it wholly free from John's tongue- a groan out of both of them at that, and it's John who will fix it, John fixes everything. John the doctor, John the soldier, John the killer of psychopaths, John the maker of tea. John who now grips, hard, too hard - yes, just like that Sherlock tries to tell him with his body, harder, hold me, hard - and shoves back in, all the way, as far as he can.
And now, for once, Sherlock bloody Holmes is going to sit still and shut up and listen to someone else. Anyone's guess what John's tongue is saying to him, thrusting as it is in and out of his arsehole, but he's paying rapt attention. Surely he can be forgiven for the not sitting still part, then. Ruthless. Impossible. Like he'll never stop. Like he's going to make him come just by working his tongue in his arse and he's right, mercy of mercies, he's right. Sherlock can feel it starting and it doesn't feel anything at all like the little spark of sensation in his once monthly cursory, clinical wanks in the shower. It feels like he's dying and that's just fine, as long as dying keeps feeling like this. The pillow takes his teeth; he'll ask its forgiveness later, when he remembers how sentences are made.
It's going 'round, this amnesia: Back between his spread thighs, John can't remember why they're doing this, can't remember anything before that first lick, only knows that he's never wanted anything so much, never been as hard and as aching and as dizzy as he is, never loved anything as much as he loves the feeling of his tongue sliding in and out of Sherlock's body. Ignores the far-away sound, closes his eyes and presses his lips around the puckered tissue where his tongue's buried and sucks, just once, just gently. Hears, finally, the no longer far-away sound. It's his name, again. But this time chipped and broken like a dish. Sounding like something being scraped violently out of Sherlock's throat. The taut back shaking so hard it moves John's head with it, his tongue anchored inside. Dazed, it takes him a long moment to register that Sherlock's- oh, he is. Crying. Underneath the moaning. Sobbing.
The split second hesitation while he considers whether to stop gives him the pre-emptive answer. No. Mustn't stop. That's what that crushed choking off of the moaning means, shocked hiccup in the song of it, so he quickly resumes, feels Sherlock relax back into his wracked agony - and sod all if that isn't a paradoxical sentence, but it's exactly what he does, falls gratefully back into the miserable moaning and the crying and the writhing and the scraped Johns and it's hard, hard to concentrate like this but he tries, focusing on thrusting his tongue deeper, harder, his fingertips sinking into the exquisite softness of flesh over hip, twisting his aching tongue now, fast, as fast as he can, because under his chin, Sherlock's bollocks have suddenly tightened and his breathing has gone from desperate to dangerous and yes- yes, now- Yes. Feels it around his tongue, hard contractions, slips a hand under just in time to catch the last ropy spurts on his fingers.
Low howl out of the broken scientist as he withdraws his tongue, a shudder that runs from wing-like scapulae all the way to lanky toes. Jesus. Will he ever see anything so- beautiful- as this? Limpid pool of ruined Sherlock, still too stunned to move, still too drowned to do anything other than mewl, quietly.
His stiff neck protests as he moves to plant a wet kiss on a particularly appealing vertebrae, climbing slowly up the bed to curl in beside him, toeing off shoes like an afterthought, haphazard wipe of sleeve over his soaked mouth. Sherlock's face is turned the other direction, and John wonders for a moment what comes next. The beginning of endless awkwardness that ends in- ending? The terrible mutual realization that this was a disastrous complication?
No help in the seaglass eyes peering widely at him now that Sherlock's turned over with an exhausted heave. Fringe plastered to his face, splotchy red flags unfurled across white skin, the leftover sniffling that trails at the heels of tears. He looks just as confused as John feels, and the fear edging into his mind is just beginning to displace the desperate lust coiled at the base of his spine when Sherlock finally breaks the silence. "Can I?" Can he what? John's no idea whatsoever - take a blood sample? cut off an ear for analysis? - but he nods, eagerly.
Oh. Permission to kiss him. Of course. Always. Any time. Forever, please. Sherlock's mouth is- impossible. Perfect bow of lip, curious, clueless tongue. When John moans against its probing, Sherlock shoves his body suddenly against him like it's a physiological reflex, like he's hit exactly the right tendon with a percussion hammer. "God, I- Sherlock." Who just stares, uncomprehending. Dumbest genius alive. Little help then, press of tortured erection against bony thigh. Oh. Oh. Bright little flare in the eye, same as any other time he's deduced something.
Spidery fingers mold themselves to the shape of it, clumsy tongue slowing as he catalogues this unfamiliar experience; John can almost hear the wheels turning in his calculating, processing mind. Curious, he presses hard with the heel of his hand. Seems satisfied with the reaction. Much fumbling trouble with the zip of course, because obviously God hates John and wants to see him suffer. When it's finally cool fingers sliding, he forgets all about gods and hypotheses and how to spell his own name; these being pointless irrelevancies, like the solar system. Forgets complication and disaster and What If worries. Remembers only this: Laughing with relief when he comes, and kissing the tip of Sherlock's nose before sleep ambushes him, helpless to resist.
Dreams a chalkboard with equations and proofs next to a bed full of naked Sherlock, sees himself holding the marked-up page in triumph: "I told you so!" Beams as Sherlock applauds his excellent scientific method and pulls him down for a kiss.
*
Morning often robs us the smiles given to us by our dreams; heartless pickpocket, reality is. In the stirring light, elevator stomach of uh-oh arrives first, or a close second anyway, after ow, my jaw and ugh, slept in my clothes. Only gets worse when he turns to find nothing but empty bed where he'd expected to find a warm length of sticky, wonderful Sherlock.
So that's it then. He's snuck off, embarrassed or unable to cope with- whatever this means. It is- a disastrous complication, and- And it's not going to feel any better lying there thinking about it. Split shift at the clinic, time to get up, shower. And try not to think about this. Breakfast, read the newspaper. And try not to think about this. Go to work and try not- Sigh.
It's only after he emerges toweled and damp from glum ablutions that he thinks to check his mobile, still in his jacket pocket. Heart leaps at the sender line, falls at the message:
Gone down to the Yard for a meeting. Pick me up some growth medium. SH
So. Business as usual. We're to- just pretend it never happened, he supposes. Turning to drop the phone onto the desk, he's pulled up short by the stack, razor-neat edges perfectly square with the desktop. Fabulous. Returned my porn. How courteous. Sour taste in his mouth - sadness, regret, other things he probably couldn't put a name to at this moment - but then he sees it.
There, next to the vigorous line originally scratched through the contested claim loudly proven last night, is now a tidy STET.
How can he not chuckle, just a bit? Lets the laugh soften the edges of the pain, just a little. Sherlock. No-one-else-like-him-anywhere-ever Sherlock. Perhaps they'll manage their way back to friendship after all, perhaps this mistake - and his heart certainly does not feel like it's got a fork properly twisting in it there - can simply be filed away as easily as the trim stack Sherlock's returned neatly in a binder clip. Allowing himself a half-smile of consolation, he reaches to tuck the bundle back into the bottom desk drawer, almost missing the tiny penciled marginalia further down the page. His gasp is quiet, but sounds loud to him in the still bedroom.
Who else but Sherlock Holmes could make him drugged with happiness with just two words? He doesn't even look at what the small, precise arrow is pointing to in the text, doesn't care. All that matters is his intrepid copyeditor's notation:
Next time?