Forgiveness and Sacrifice (Sherlock's Daughter)

Now spoken

Trigger warning!!!!
Please skip if you need to.

It is dark out. A sudden blackness swept across the sky. I am alone in my empty flat. I realise that now is when I have to come to terms with the evidence, I have to speak it out, acknowledge it. I realised it precisely 24 hours ago and drowned it away in drink. First stage is always denial.

The last patient is recovering. Do something or you'll become one.

Last week Tristan began to recover. Two days ago I visited him. He was unconscious, tubes were weaving in and out of him, death was draining his colours away. I held his hand so tightly, trying to squeeze my life into him. It didn't work. He lay still. The boy who acted quickly and bandaged my hand all those years ago. The boy who tried to teach me to swim. The boy who loved, hated and forgave me. The boy who is no longer a boy but a lifeless man.
Afterwards I did what most people would do; I wept and ran to my mum for comfort. It was in the moments that it came to me. When I sat in her arms and sobbed my heart out. I stopped crying in an instant and stood up. I had already seen the evidence. I walked out and spoke not another word till the next morning with a bottle and hangover in hand.

In the loneliness of my flat I whisper:
"Mum killed him. Mum killed Tristan. Mum is a murder, she killed Tristan."

My confession shakes me. Words have power, especially when they are spoken and these are spoken words.

THAT BITCH! SLY, MURDEROUS, LYING, BETRAYING, FUCKING BITCH! I kick over the chair and flip the sofa. Smashing several mugs of old tea, I scream. My anger turns into sadness.
"WHY?" I scream. "WHY? Why, why, why?" I sob, hiccuping and slamming my fists helplessly against the wall as I slide down curling into a ball. Shaking and whimpering, I think about how well things had been going...

Again the drumming comes back but this time it pounds a steady beat that pierces my head. Again all I see is colours and the world blurs out. I bang my head repeatedly on the wall to the rhythm of the drums. My hands punch the floor till my knuckles bleed. All sense seems to disappear.
It's all my fault. It's all my fault. It's all my fault.
I sit on the cold kitchen floor. I've been here before.
Scarlet stains my hands, my wrists. A swamp of sick drown my feet. Sweat trickles down my face.
I take I swig of drink. It burns my throat.
Why does everyone I care about have to die? Why? Why am I not dead? Why am I not dead?
In a blur and drunken stumble I find myself standing waist deep in the River Thames. With one last gulp of alcohol, I wade deeper.

I can't swim.