What The House Forgot

A Middle Child of Madness

"There's something going on there," Rosie declared at last. John, who had been reaching for the glasses, paused.
"What's something?" he clarified with a blink. Rosie leaned against the granite countertop, pulling herself into a sitting position so that the heels of her black combat boots kicked against the wooden cabinets, presumably destined to leave a black scuff mark in their wake.
"I mean, something. Something romantic," Rosie clarified. John swallowed hard, dropping his hand back to his side and blinking in clarification. Romantic? No, that couldn't be right.
"Victor would never. He's not brave enough for that sort of stuff," John protested.
"And how would you know?" Rosie insisted.
"Because I've known him for our whole lives, ma'am! You've only known him for four months!"
"Don't you ma'am me," Rosie sneered. "Besides, I don't think Victor needs any more confidence if Sherlock's involved. Sherlock takes what he wants, and if he's decided that Victor is his next prey, then so be it."
"Victor's been a loner all his life. He's not going to stop now," John protested. He remembered, of course, all that he had been teasing Victor about before. Well of course the signs of attraction were there, Victor's heart was plastered upon his face, ready to be read by anyone observant enough to take notice. He might as well be screaming his admiration. But John never thought he would go through with it? He never imagined that Victor, that clumsy, lanky idiot, would even find himself a partner of such high caliber.
"You must be misreading," John determined at last. Finally he reached up to grab a glass, figuring he had to have something to show for himself when he returned to the room.
"Oh don't choose blindness, John. They're leaning all over each other. I haven't seen Sherlock that giggly since he got his wisdom teeth out," Rosie complained. "Something's going on. I'd be so bold as to say they're smitten."
"Sherlock must have better taste than Victor," John muttered, turning on the tap so as to drown out the doubtful little laughs from Rosie. The girl continued to kick her shoes against the counter, as if to try to draw more attention to herself. John allowed the water to overflow in the glass, bubbling back into the sink in a miniature fountain, before finally turning off the tap and allowing the excess water to fall back into the void before he began to sip.
"I sense jealousy," Rosie decided at last. "Don't you remember what my mother said? All her little conspiracy theories?"
"Oh, please. I don't want to hear about her right now," John grumbled. He held his glass to his lips, allowing the water to play over his face without taking a sip. He remembered rather abruptly the stories she had told, that Sherlock and Victor were married at one point. That, even though they were only seventeen, they had somehow already been engaged.
"She keeps elaborating. The more she knows about you, the more excited she is to share what she knows," Rosie chuckled. "She just keeps going on and on."
"She doesn't know anything about me. Not of them, either. I don't care who she used to know, I don't care that she's jumbled up all those names in her head. I'm not her husband, I'm not whoever the h*ll she thinks I am. I never knew your mother," John defended.
"You know what happened to my father?" Rosie wondered, her eyes stiffening behind her cropped blonde hair. A sudden seriousness that seemed to be unprecedented in her usually expressionless face. John hesitated, having heard enough rumors to put two and two together.
"He died," John explained.
"He didn't just die. He killed himself. He slit his wrists, John. Up the arm. Like yours."
"Like...like mine? What do you think I do in my free..." John's words were cut off when Rosie lunged off of the counter, grabbing at John's wrist and pulling his arm into the kitchen light. She bent back his hand to reveal his bare forearm, allowing his birthmarks to show plainly against the darkness. A long, silver line tracing up towards his elbow. A jagged, sloppy line, as if traced with a shaking hand.
"As if I've not seen these scars," Rosie snarled, her grip tightening in retaliation.
"They're birthmarks, Rosie. Not scars. I've never killed myself, if you haven't noticed!"
"John, my mother may be crazy, but I'm starting to wonder if she's telling the truth about all of this," Rosie insisted. John wrestled his hand away in disgust, stepping back defensively, expecting the girl to start digging around on his body to try to find some other incriminating mark left from, from what exactly? From his past life?
"You think I'm your father? You honestly..."
"Yes," Rosie declared without hesitation. John blinked. Rosie stared.
"You're crazy too. It's genetic," John decided, turning away in exasperation.
"My parents split right before he died; they split because of that house. He owned the house, inherited it. And he ran away to France with a student, a man named Sherlock Holmes. And when they got back, they had an artist with them, Victor Trevor. My father had an affair with Sherlock, and then he..."
"Rosie, shut up!" John snarled. "I don't want to hear this, this is madness!"
"Well then tell me what's going on!" Rosie declared, matching John's anger as she raised her voice to a level that would threaten the Trevor parents' sleep. Perhaps it was even heard over the yelling of Mario. John faltered, his eyes narrowing. "You've not been to that house yet, John. I think it's time you saw for yourself what we're so afraid of."
"I'm not afraid of a house," John insisted.
"You will be, I'm sure," Rosie snapped. She folded her arms, her eyes ferocious, though John had to force himself to turn away. He had to walk away, or else he would stay and believe. And he couldn't believe that, not yet. Because if he allowed himself to be her father, then he allowed himself to be the second of many John Watsons. And in that case, Sherlock was also a duplicate, as was Victor. If he was Rosie's father, Victor was Sherlock's lover. And if Victor was Sherlock's lover, John was their murderer. It simply couldn't be true.