SHERLOCK STRANGE IMAGINE

I'M READY [D.S]

Stephen breathed heavily as the students were dismissed. Like always, he hadn’t yet conquered the ability to create anything with his destroyed hands. He sighed, looking down at his scars and swallowing his disgust. He was such a failure.

“Stephen, may I speak to you?” the Ancient One asked. 

He stepped off his mat. “I’m sorry, it’s my hands-”

“I’m not here to discuss that,” she said, “although I can assure you that your hands are not the problem.”

He lowered them. “Then what do you want to discuss?” He silently prayed that she wasn’t about to kick him out before he even had a chance to prove himself.

“My apprentice,” she said, holding her head high with pride. At the same moment, a figure stepped out of the Ancient One’s shadow. One look at her eyes and Stephen was taken back years into the past. 

“She’s my daughter, too, sir,” Stephen yelled. He was holding a stuffed pink bear and a bouquet of flowers, standing in the hospital hallway. “I only want to be a part of her life.”

“Oh, what is with the sudden desire to be so domestic?” Stephen’s ex’s mother asked, tears in her eyes. “Where were you when the labor started, or when my daughter thought she would have to live out on the streets?” Her arms were crossed across her face and her anger was evident. Her husband gently pushed her towards the room behind him. 

“Please, I know I screwed up, but I just want to-”

“I’m sorry, but my daughter doesn’t want you to see her. She doesn’t want you to be involved in any part of her life. It would be better if you left.” He put his arm around his wife and turned, heading back into the hospital room.

“You can’t do this!” he screamed. The gifts dropped to the floor. He pushed through his ex girlfriend’s parents, running towards the room where she had given birth the previous night. “Melanie!” he screamed, seeing the woman in the hospital gown, getting an IV taken out of her arm. She met his eyes for a brief moment, then looked away. Whether in anger or disappointment, he was not sure. “You can’t keep my daughter from me-”

“Call security. Call security!”

Stephen felt a pair of arms wrap around him. He fought them, cursing and pleading. He was a screw up. He knew that. He was too young to be a father but he was one anyway, only he wasn’t allowed in his baby’s life-

As the security escorted him out of the hospital, he went by the nursery. Stephen, weakly, with tears in his eyes, stopped. He pressed himself against the glass window, seeing the lines of babies in there. 

He could have picked you out anywhere. 

He saw your name, Y/n, and pressed his fingers against the glass. He ached to hold you, to feel your grip around his finger-

“Come on, sir. Let’s not make this difficult,” one of the security guards said. 

Stephen let them peel him away from the glass, because you opened your eyes and looked directly at him through the glass. He felt a part of his heart shatter, and he left it right there in the hospital with you.