Falling For You

A Visit

A week had gone by since John Watson and Sherlock Holmes had parted. Not a day had gone by on either end where tears did not pour. Sherlock left his room. He hadn't had a single bite of food since John left. John hardly left his flat. His sister had taken up the role of mother.

"John," she said, knocking on his door. "Give him a call, will you?"

"No," he replied definitively from behind the door.

Harry, who shared John's gentle eyes, opened the door. She saw her brother in a horrible state. He was sitting on the floor of his room with his phone in his hands. He had been texting Sherlock nonstop, totally worried about him. He'd even called him twice, but Sherlock hadn't said a word in return.

"John-"

"He won't pick up. What if something's wrong?" he asked, his soft eyes red with tears. Harry joined her brother on the floor. She wrapped her tender arms around her brother to comfort him, but he was totally hysterical.

"I'm sure he's fine," she tried.

John leaned onto her for support. "He won't pick up."

"Go visit him," she suggested, her voice like a blanket covering John in a newfound security. But he still had promised himself that he wouldn't go back.

"He doesn't want to see me," John sobbed. He couldn't help but feel like it was all his fault. He should have kept pretending because lies were better than the pain he was feeling after the fall.

"You're right. He needs to see you," Harry said. John looked at his sister and found himself smiling ever-so-slightly. She always knew the right thing to say, at least when she was sober.

"Thank you," John said.

He got into a cab with the help of Harry and rode off to 221B Baker Street. He found himself happy for the first time in a week. He was so excited to see Sherlock, but he was also worried that he wasn't okay. He was basically an emotional mess, but 221B Baker Street had come into view and John's heart was back to fluttering. He practically flew out of the cab, unaware of how much he had missed the place in the past week. He closed his eyes and he could practically hear Sherlock obnoxiously playing the violin at three in the morning. He could taste the coffee he mad in the mornings and he could smell something burning from one of Sherlock's experiments.

He knocked on the door and waited a few seconds for Mrs. Hudson to come to the door.

"Mr. Holmes isn't taking clients—"

Her face turned to a grin when she saw that it wasn't a client at all standing at her door.

"Is Sherlock here?" John asked, his cheery face suddenly painted back on as if 221B Baker Street just made him filled with glee.

"Upstairs. But he hasn't been out all week," Mrs. Hudson said. Without another word, John sprinted up the stairs, his heart pounding with every step.

John looked around the flat and didn't see Sherlock anywhere. He saw his violin collecting dust on the table by his leather chair. The kitchen was a mess but it was exactly the same as it was the day John left. John felt a lump in his throat. There was no noise coming anywhere from the flat. John ran to Sherlock's room and rapped on the door.

"Go away," a weak voice said from within the room.

"Sherlock! Jesus, are you alright?" John asked in a loud and panicked voice.

Sherlock's eyes opened wide in shock. "John?" he asked, his voice as raspy as a sick man's. He hadn't spoken in almost three days. He hadn't spoken since Mrs. Hudson had last tried giving him tea, trying to force him to eat.

"Yeah, it's me. Sherl... I'm worried about you. I've called and I've texted and I thought you were—"

"I'm fine," Sherlock lied. In all truth, he was lying on the ground in the fetal position, listening to the rain fall outside. He thought of each falling raindrop as one of his tears, and the rain was really coming down.

"You don't sound fine," John countered. Sherlock rolled his stormy eyes and shifted his position so he was facing away from the door, away from heartbreak. But John wasn't pulling away. He was moving closer to make sure that Sherlock was okay and that he wasn't falling apart like John was. He wondered if Sherlock was even capable of falling apart or falling at all.

"Go away," Sherlock replied.

"Mrs. Hudson says you haven't come out of that room all week," John said, tears threatening his eyes. He told himself not to cry, not when Sherlock would be able to make fun of him for the tears he shed.

"What do you care?" Sherlock asked.

The words stung John, but he ventured on. "Just because you don't love me doesn't mean that I don't love you. I'm worried, Sherlock. I hardly leave my flat. I rarely sleep anymore. I'm so bloody worried about you and I miss you so much."

Little did John know that he was talking to air.