SHERLOCK 🌟SMUTSHORTS🌟

2. Broken vow (part 4)

John:

You don't thank him when you wake up. Your daily emotional outburst quota is spent for the day. You are exhausted. The monotony of having to get up and go about some ridiculous daily routine is daunting.

Suddenly, you just can't look at him in your bed. Too wrong. Or too right. It's the latter that scares you.

As always, he knows exactly what's going on in your head. He leaves before you've fully formed the thought and something stings badly in your chest as you hear the soft thuds of his footsteps run down the steps.

You spend the morning in your usual seat, staring out the window, seeing nothing, seeing everything.

You have been here before. This grief. This pattern. It knocks against the inside of your skull with a tune you've long since memorized. You are lost. The past and the present meld into one never-ending cacophony of shattered faces and dead-still eyes, screams and cries, all projected against the window glass, playing over and over again until all you want to do is claw out your eyes and run as fast as your legs can carry you.

But then he's there. Dressed in his usual best. Shielding you from the plastered images splattered against that unholy window. He has his violin in hand and for a moment, you fear some upbeat jingle. You expect he'll play something funny, something lighthearted perhaps, and the prospect has your heart lurching with agony. You cannot bare this ridicule, his music making light of your grief just as his words did long ago.

You're about to stand up in a fit when the melody begins. A couple of high notes followed by a somber dip. His long fingers dig into the strings and his wrist glides with soft and agile strokes. This isn't funny at all. The melody is soft and sure. Every note like a heartbeat and a sigh. You recognize a vague similarity to your wedding waltz and your breath catches in your throat. Was it always this sad?

You look at his face and try to get your answer there. Indeed, there is something taking hold of this man's muscles and twisting them at the edges. Your breathing slows and all the images dissolve save for the image of Sherlock playing the violin. Everything's clear between the notes. He's talking to you, singing to you, heck he's even dancing for you, shifting from laughter to tears and dipping into all the various emotions in between. Since when was he like this? Even in your fantasies, Sherlock's emotions are limited to triumphant, insane, brilliant, arrogant and sometimes entertaining.

Then again, it might all be another lie, another mask. You clench your fists into the fabric of the sofa and try desperately to dismiss the thought. You can't.

You close your eyes and listen only to the melody. No Sherlock, no window, nothing. How long you stay there is beyond you. How he manages to continue to play through it all is a question that only pops into your head much much later. After he stops playing and seamlessly puts on a classical recording you've never heard before, possibly his own. After he's somehow managed to order some food for the both of you. After he clears and sets the table. After he sits down and begins to eat his meal, something you've never seen him do without a fight. After he arranges your food on a plate with extra portions of your favorite vegetables.

Meanwhile, you sit across from him and watch.

The flat has never been this silent.

The weight of everything that's gone unspoken is heavier than anything 221B has ever witnessed.

Both of you barely finish your meals and he doesn't attempt to order anything else for the rest of the day. Instead, he returns to the violin.

The collection he plays is utterly perfect and you manage not to think of anything so long as he's playing. It's well into the night when your eyelids begin to droop and you find yourself desperately rebelling against the tides of sleep.

No, not again. You can't sleep. Not now, not ever. Not without–

You're a soldier― Keep it together!

You will yourself off the couch and move across the room, trying not to drag your feet. He doesn't turn to look at you shuffling about like an overgrown lummox, and you are grateful and … slightly disappointed.

You stop at the door. Do you say something? Good night? But that's not what you want… No, you can't ask for that.

Can you?

You've waited too long. He's looking at you.

He knows.

"I was just uhh…yeah…"

Your eyes barely have enough time to widen. His long fingers have wrapped around your wrist and he's pulling you up the stairs like an eager child. His face is blank. But there's an excitement and a tension to his steps, so completely opposite to how he sounded after you shunned him away this morning.

Always slow on the deductions, you're still analyzing his footsteps when he sets you down on the bed and falls to the floor between your thighs.

You could never have brought yourself to ask for this. So of course, he saved you the trouble. Saved you the shame. The color still rises to your cheeks as he unbuttons your pants. His long white fingers have you enthralled and it's only because you're staring at them so intensely that you notice the slight tremble. You can't possibly tell if it's fear or passion that's responsible, you're not Sherlock after all.

The question is rendered null and void as soon as he takes your length into his mouth. Hot and soft, urgent and gentle, he sucks and kisses. The heat of his throat is too much. The softness of his lips is too much. It's in the way his palms rest against your hips as his nails dig under your skin. It's the way his breathing is shallow, lungs filling up with labored breath as he sucks and swipes his tongue against your tip. It's in the way he frantically takes you all in…he hasn't done this before because you can see him shudder with the effort to control his gag reflex.

You hate that you've lived with this man so much that you can't even enjoy a fucking blow job without analyzing it.

And he's not looking at you.

You hate the desperate need you have to look into his eyes right now. You thread your fingers into his curls and pull savagely. Still, he does not look up. You think you understand. You think you don't and you're not even sure you want to.

You hate that it's only now that you've come to this point. Years of waiting and this has to happen now, three days after the death of your daughter–

"S-stop." Your voice is hoarser than you'd expected; lighter than you'd intended. "Stop– Sherlock!"

He sucks harshly and practically swallows you whole. The warmth of it takes your breath away; the desperation stuns your mind to stillness.

He doesn't want this to end.

"Sherlock…?"

He jerks at the sound of his name, your voice falling against his ears like the lash of a whip.

This has to end.

You grab his shoulders through the haze while you still can, before his heat can consume you, before this passion can burn you all the way through. For a moment your hands almost forget what they'd intended, resting against his bony shoulders that tremble slightly beneath your touch.

This has to end.

You push him off.

Painfully, desperately, you push him off.

Before you can even worry about your state of arousal, the look in his eyes flags you down instantly.

You never thought you'd ever see Sherlock Holmes weeping at your feet.