Just An Ocean Apart

This Isn't How It's Supposed to Be

Sherlock's stomach flipped uncontrollably and suddenly his tail felt numb, and John walked up to the glass, forcing a smile onto his face.
"Hello Sherlock." He muttered. Sherlock closed his eyes, forcing the early tears out of his eyes and swimming up to the glass, a look of pure pain on his face.
"John." he muttered. That seemed to be acceptable; it was the only word that mattered after all.
"You asked me to come, I assume it's important?" John asked, rocking back and forth on his heels nervously, as if he knew exactly what was going to happen. Sherlock just stared at him, trying to accept that he was truly there, and it wasn't just a figment of Sherlock's imagination. He had been dreaming of this moment, of this truth, for so long, and now that it was actually here he wished he could move it off another three years or so.
"I need..." Sherlock took a deep breath, regaining his composure, trying to make sure his voice stayed steady. "I need to talk to you. To tell you something. To tell you...everything." John shuffled uncomfortably on his feet, switching his weight from one foot to the other and tapping his fingers even more nervously.
"Is there something I don't know?" he wondered. Sherlock just laughed, a guilty little giggle of irony that probably shouldn't have happened.
"Oh John, there is just so much you don't know." He agreed, his eyes snapping back up and taking their place right where they were meant to be, staring into John's and reading the very contents of his soul.
"Sherlock, tell me. I deserve to know." John insisted.
"Yes, I know. And I'm going to tell you." Sherlock agreed. "This isn't easy, you know, all of these secrets, all of this truth."
"I know Sherlock. Secrets are hard on everyone." John agreed, his voice sounding a little bit shaky as he stepped even closer to the glass. Sherlock took a deep breath, closing his eyes for a moment and living in the last moment of secrecy, the last moment where John didn't know everything that he did.
"John, I know what's missing in your heart. I know what it's calling for and I know exactly why." Sherlock insisted.
"I'm not in love with you." John said flatly. Sherlock knew that was coming, and he tried not to let it affect him.
"Yes John." he muttered, looking down at the ground in shame, his stomach twisting. "Yes you are."
"Don't make up stories, Sherlock, don't lie to me, don't lie to yourself!" John exclaimed, taking a step back with a sad smile on his face.
"I'm not lying, John, just..."
"Don't play this game Sherlock."
"LISTEN TO ME!" Sherlock screamed, his words echoing off of the stone walls and bouncing all around the two of them, John's smile fading off of his face, Sherlock's chest heaving up and down.
"John there are things you don't know, memories you lost, time that had gotten erased from your memory all because you took a potion, a potion I had given you, to erase your most current memories, to erase all of the time we had spent together." Sherlock insisted. John stared at him for a moment, and stepped closer.
"When was this?" he wondered, his voice very small, obviously not believing a word.
"Months ago, John. Months." Sherlock whispered, flicking his tail through the water uncomfortably.
"You're saying we knew each other before?" John wondered. Sherlock nodded, trying to think of an easy way to put this.
"There are more of us, more merpeople, and there's a kingdom right below your shores, on the bottom of the ocean, I'm a prince there, actually." Sherlock started.
"What are you even..."
"Let me finish, please John, just hear me out." Sherlock begged, and John silenced himself.
"Alright, alright." John muttered.
"I saw you on the docks, John, and I fell in love with you. Hopelessly in love, and I didn't even know your name." Sherlock muttered. John just stared, his mouth hanging open in shock, but he didn't say anything. "So I made a potion, and I drank it, and I lost my tail and grew legs in place of it, and I wandered to the shores as a shipwrecked prince and became your servant, I worked alongside Greg, and you had no idea that I was a merman. The whole time, we connected, I fell deeper in love with you, and you started to get feelings for me, real feelings. And then you went down to the docks and my brother kidnapped you, he pulled you under the waves and trapped you in a glass tank filled with air, and placed you in his throne room like a trophy, until I took another potion, regrew my tail, and swam down to the surface to rescue you. Mycroft wanted to kill you, he thought that you would give away our existence and our home, and he wanted you dead, so I compromised. I said that we should wipe your memory of everything that happened, so that you could still live your life. He agreed. So I took you to the surface and put you on the docks and there we shared our first kiss, and it was lovely, and we were both in tears, and you were telling me how you'd miss me so much, and how you would live in pleasant obliviousness while I suffered with the memory that we had once been in love. And then you drank the potion and passed out and woke up a little later with no memory that the two of us had ever met. And Greg found you, and I watched as he carried you away, and I knew that after that moment, even if we did meet again, that none of it would matter anymore. That you'd move on with your life and never remember me." Sherlock said. It felt like a million pounds of bricks had been lifted off of his shoulders, but even as he talked, he saw that they started to crush John, and he stared, blank and expressionless, for a little moment until Sherlock was ready to go on.
"I thought I was prepared to leave you John, I really did, when I heard that you would be traveling off to get a bride, to get Mary, and I knew that I had to stop you. So I swam with your ship and watched as you were thrown overboard, and I saved you, and ever since then, I have been wondering when you would find out the truth, all of this time I had loved you and wondered when you might love me back." Sherlock finished. John stared at him for a moment, and quietly he slipped the potion out of his pocket, the little red vial that could change both of their lives.
"You're saying that...you're saying that we were in love?" he muttered. Sherlock smiled, a hopeful, desperate smile, putting a hand on the glass and almost laughing in relief. The truth felt so good.
"Yes John, yes, we have been, you just haven't realized." He whispered.
"This potion...?" John muttered, keeping his head down, facing the ground, but looking at Sherlock through some miraculous strain of the eyes.
"Restores your lost memories, you'll remember me, you'll remember everything. You'll remember our love and you'll come back, to me, to what we had." Sherlock insisted, his fingers flexing on the glass and wishing they could hold John's once more. Carelessly, simply, perfectly.
"How do I know you're not lying?" John asked, his face snapping out of wonder and back into anger.
"Why would I ever do that?" Sherlock insisted. John stared at him, not looking amused, and slipped the potion back into his pocket.
"I don't know. I just know that this might be a desperate attempt for me not to marry Mary, you might have concocted this story overnight in a desperate attempt to win my heart over." John insisted. Sherlock swam even closer to the glass so that he was practically pressed up against it, feeling tears sting his eyes as he stared into the unamused eyes of John Watson. He had known this would happen, he had known this was what John would say. But of course, even though he knew it was coming, he still wasn't prepared. And he still wouldn't except it as John's answer.
"Ask Greg; ask Harry, Clara, your father, the cooks, anyone. They know me, they know us, John, we kissed, I know the taste of your lips and the touch of your skin and the feeling of your hair, John, I know you." Sherlock insisted.
"Greg knew about this huh?" John laughed, trying his best to look as if this didn't trouble him.
"I know your mother died of tuberculous, I know that you have a horse, and another calmer one named Chestnut, I know that you have a teddy bear, named Mr. Bear, hidden in your trunk at the foot of your bed." Sherlock insisted. John blinked for a moment, as if not knowing how to respond to that.
"You're lying Sherlock, Greg told you all of this, you're lying, you have to be lying!" John insisted, tears of stress running down his cheeks, clenching his fists in frustration. He looked terrified, trying desperately to mask that fear in frustration, in confusion, in amusement. But Sherlock knew everything about the boy standing in front of him, the boy forced to be a man, and he knew what lay behind the thin mask of forced emotion. He saw everything.
"No I'm not, John, drink the potion, know the truth, I love you, John Watson, I love you with every single fiber of my body, I'm willing to shout it..."
"What am I supposed to do Sherlock?" John exclaimed, slamming his foot on the stone and silencing Sherlock. "What am I supposed to do, of course I believe you, of course...of course you're not lying, but what am I supposed to do?"
"What do you mean?" Sherlock whispered. John squeezed his eyes shut and let out a sob, leaning against the glass with one hand and covering his face, almost in embarrassment, with the other. Sherlock leveled his hand with John's pretending that there wasn't a glass wall separating them, pretending as if they were holding hands once more.
"I'm marrying Mary tomorrow afternoon, Sherlock, we're engaged, the plans are made, Sherlock there's no turning back." John whispered.
"Yes there is, that's why I told you now, John, please, you can always just..."
"No I can't. Sherlock, if I left Mary for my merman, people would think I was insane, people would think that I had lost it, that I was unfit to be a ruler, to be a king. I can't love a merman, even if I had before." John whispered. Sherlock's face contorted into a face of pure depression, of horror, without his consent, and before he knew it his lips had curled down into a deep frown and his eyes squeezed shut in an attempt to block out the tears.
"What if I wasn't a merman?" Sherlock insisted, pressing both hands to the glass in a desperate attempt to get closer. No matter how close he got though, that glass would always be there. It was a metaphor, in some way, but he was too distraught to think of one.
"Are you going to whip up some of your miracle potion then?" John asked in a low growl.
"Yes, of course, I need you to believe me John, I need you to love me, I've come too far for anything else." Sherlock insisted. John just shook his head in disbelief, in sadness, in fear, standing upright and wiping the tears from his face, trying to regain his composure if at all possible.
"No Sherlock, I'm sorry. I won't drink it, if I have to live in careless obliviousness, fine. Be that way. But I need to marry Mary tomorrow, there's no other way. I don't really know what I felt for you before, frankly, I don't care. If Mary wasn't here it would be different, maybe...maybe we could have a chance. I'm sorry Sherlock." John muttered, starting to turn away.
"No, JOHN NO!" Sherlock screamed, pounding on the glass of his tank until he was worried he would crack it. "JOHN PLEASE, LISTEN TO ME, JOHN, I LOVE YOU!" Sherlock shrieked, clawing his way to the top of the cage, to the surface of the water.
"John, come back, oh please, please John, WE WERE SUPPOSED TO BE IN LOVE!" Sherlock screamed, but obviously John didn't listen. Obviously he didn't care, because as soon as Sherlock finished his sentence, he was gone. The doors were shut, and whatever was left of John Watson was just his retreating footsteps, and he let Sherlock sink to the bottom of his tank in defeat, staring up at the surface of the water and wondering if it was even worth it anymore. John had made up his mind, and no matter what Sherlock said, it wouldn't matter. No matter what Sherlock thought, even with the most powerful of truths on his side, John was going to marry Mary Morstan, and there was absolutely nothing Sherlock could do about it. And that's when the tears started to fall once more, but these were painful, agonizing tears, racking his body with the most horrible of defeats, making him twitch and screech and sob, paralyzed with defeat, with love loss. John was the only one in the world he was ever going to love, that could ever possibly love him, and he was off to love someone else. Sherlock had failed, and now it was time for plan B. John said he couldn't love a merman, so let's just see how much he could love a human.