White Noise

Technically It's Not Stalking...

"I can make you some macaroni and cheese if you want." Mary offered, changing the subject slowly and leaning against the armrest.
"I'm fine; I'll have that left over roast beef." John assured.
"That's all dry and gross, I'll make you something, come on." Mary insisted.
"Mary I said I'm fine!" John repeated agressivley, raising his voice to get the point across the best he could. Mary was silent, almost taken aback by his sudden aggression, but finally she nodded her head, sighing sharply, as if she didn't know what she was expecting.
"Alright then, eat the roast beef. I'll be upstairs if you need me." Mary grumbled. John waited a good twenty seconds after hearing her footsteps stop before he got off of the couch. He wanted to be sure that she was gone, really gone. He wasn't hungry, he couldn't eat, how could he eat with his twisting stomach? There were more important things than food and nutrition, there was love, there was Sherlock Holmes. When John was sure that Mary was gone he grabbed his laptop from the coffee table, propping himself up against the armrest with a pillow, and turning it on. He watched the blue lights for a moment before signing in, staring at his background of a nice relaxing lake, wishing more than anything he could be there, wherever it was. He hadn't actually taken the picture, it had come with the laptop, however any place was better than here. John logged onto Facebook with the spam account he had made way back when, in an attempt to stalk Mary and her friends to see what they were doing on girls' night out. He had known it would come in handy one day, and as promised, with only one search result of Sherlock Holmes, thousands of names came up. Surely there can't be all that many people with such a ridiculous name, right? John scrolled carelessly through the list, scanning the profile pictures and trying to spot one that stood out. He would know that account when he saw it, just as he had known the name when he saw it. Because he was meant to find this man, it was his job, his destiny. John scrolled not much farther when he saw a picture, a silhouette, of a tall man with curly hair outlined by a harsh backlight, as if in some sort of makeshift modeling shot. It was him, John could just tell. He clicked on the name very eagerly, scrolling through all of these reposted pictures about equal rights and feminism, even a couple of cute little cats falling down the stairs. John was almost doubtful that this was the man he had met; surely he didn't care too much about other people? He had come across as so careless, as so out there, John was almost surprised to see that he was on such rubbish social media sites in the first place. But as he scrolled down there lay a picture, hidden among the rest of the text posts and the reblogs, a beautiful picture of the beautiful man. It was some sort of glamor shot, that was for sure, Sherlock was sitting out on an expensive looking terrace, his legs crossed and his back leaning right along the railing with his arms dangling over the railing and supporting him. His head was tilted back so that his neck was fully exposed, and his eyes looked off towards the world beyond, his black curls being ruffled by unfelt wind. Oh he looked beautiful, sitting there on that cushioned bench, with the dying sunlight spread softly over the city and over his pale skin, his sharp cheekbones shading his cheeks and his eyes alight with emotion, with power. It was him, the man, the only man, the only human that mattered anymore. John must've stared at that beautiful picture for five minutes before finally blinking, before finally taking a breath. How could anyone even think to compete with a being such as Sherlock Holmes? How could they even begin to comprehend his beauty? And who was deserving of him? Who had his heart? Would Sherlock even cast an eye at a man like John, or did he strive for the more traditional relationship, the more acceptable one? John didn't care, it didn't matter what Sherlock wanted in a relationship, John would be that someone. He would be anything at all, or nothing, everything that Sherlock wanted and anything that he had ever hoped for. John would be his life and his love and his existence, and in turn Sherlock need only give him a single ounce of his precious love, a single moment of recognition, and that shall be enough. John's life would be complete, and all that he needed was a single glance from the man he so desperately wanted to call his own. John screenshotted the image onto his computer, saving it under a file he titled 'work', just so Mary wouldn't think to look in it. Obviously he couldn't save pictures of Sherlock into a file named 'Sherlock', or 'the man I am hoping to leave you for', it would be too obvious. Mary cared about as much about John's work as John himself did, and that means she didn't care at all. She would never want to look in a folder titled 'work', and that was the reason he named it that. John scrolled once more through the Facebook page, cherishing every typed letter, knowing that somewhere, weeks, maybe years back, Sherlock had typed that very letter into his computer with dainty, beautiful fingers. John could imagine Sherlock's manicured nails pressing key after key, revealing the words that had been cooped up in his mind, the first ones that popped into that beautiful brain. As John scrolled something into five weeks he saw that Sherlock wasn't alone in his pictures, there was another man, one that was also attractive but nothing compared to his companion. He had short cut brown hair, with a wave in the front that probably took him all morning to put together. He was taller than Sherlock by a hair, his skin tanner, his smile wider, but his face much less elegant, his body more muscular than beautifully slim. The presence of that man sent an angry shiver down John's spine, for some reason the happiness that shown in his blue eyes angered John to no end. There was something about the way these pictures were taken; there was something about the closeness, the smiles, the captions. They were dates, some of them, others simple hearts, and others read very cheesy captions, like the heart doesn't have to travel far to find its destination. John had to bow his head in disgust, in sudden painful realization. Sherlock's heart belonged to someone else; it had apparently found its destination in the soul of a miserable muscly man with perfectly white teeth. But of course, that might have changed. It's been five days, and Sherlock hadn't posted anything about the stranger since then. Maybe something happened; maybe Sherlock's heart simply wasn't satisfied with the man standing next to him in these smiling photographs. This was a good thing; of course, if John's pathetic brain could learn to be optimistic for a short moment. It meant that Sherlock was, indeed, gay. It meant that he fancied men, and that his beautiful heart was being swept away not by frail women, but by strong, able bodied men. So there was no gender barrier, that was good, that was one less problem John had to worry about in his conquest to find the true love of his life. He sighed heavily, scrolling past the pictures with the boyfriend until he found another shot of just Sherlock, this time taken against a brick wall background, it was just his head and shoulders, but his slender fingers were trailing down his cheek, as though marking the paths where the tears had fallen. His eyes were wide, staring intensely at the camera with galaxies swelling and exploding in their midst. His lips were slightly parted, as though he were breathing through his mouth, as though he was feeling something, powerful emotions, that disrupted his respiratory system. Passion, love, desire, John could see those emotions in his eyes, staring into the camera, projecting his soul into the photograph....and then posting it on Facebook. It was a rather odd place to post such a beautiful and meaningful picture, it was a picture of love and of lust, and Sherlock had posted it where his grandmother could easily see it. That beautiful man was a beautiful idiot. Nevertheless John saved the picture as well, making a whopping two pictures in his little work folder. John slouched even farther down to the couch, resting his laptop onto of his stomach where he could get a nice clear view of Sherlock from where he lay. He opened up the second one once more, staring into Sherlock's eyes, trailing his own fingertips where Sherlock's lie, however he didn't feel the touch of Sherlock's skin, he felt the miserable feeling of touching a grimy laptop screen, smudging it up until he could barely see Sherlock's face clearly.
"Daddy, Daddy!" cried a tiny voice from below, and suddenly John was attacked by his five year old daughter, jumping over the couch and landing flatly on his chest. John heaved for a breath, closing his laptop the best he could and setting it aside. Rosie.
"Rosie what is it, what do you want?" John wondered miserably, struggling to breathe while her weight crushed down upon his lungs.
"To say goodnight of course!" Rosie exclaimed happily. John just noticed that it was around eight o'clock, and Rosie was now sporting her princess onesie pajamas. How long has he been stalking Sherlock Holmes? Nearly two hours it would seem, and just now his stomach started to growl. Rosie giggled, listing to the growling in John's stomach as though her father's starvation was some sort of joke.
"Your tummy makes funny noises." She observed with a screeching, horrible laugh. The little child, descendant of the Devil, and most certainly created in her image. Rosie looked just like Mary, and maybe that was the reason John felt no love for the child. Yes of course, she was adorable, she was the perfect girl, never complained, never threw fits, never did anything outrageous. But she had blonde hair, and the same pointed nose, and same eyes as Mary Morstan, and whenever John looked upon his daughter he only saw his wife, only smaller, and somehow that was worse. Rosie reminded him that even once his wife had decayed into the ground, she would still be around through Rosie. As long as Rosie lived, Mary lived, and as long as Mary lived John could never be truly happy.
"I thought you were going to bed." John muttered.
"I am, I just wanted to say goodnight." Rosie said with a smile, her feet digging into John's stomach painfully as she tried to balance on his torso.
"Well then, goodnight." John muttered, thinking longingly of the laptop, and of the work he still had to do.
"Goodnight daddy." Rosie said with a smile, giving him a very awkward hug before finally rolling off of his chest and back to the ground. John didn't say goodnight back, but he assumed that she took his silence as an answer of her own, and she quickly disappeared back up the stairs where she had come from. John groaned miserably, sitting up in the couch once more and opening the laptop to display Sherlock's picture, the eyes staring so deeply into his soul that he was sure that Sherlock Holmes was staring at him, wherever he currently lay. Probably nestled in a stranger's bed, wrapped in their arms and feeling their kisses on his beautiful radiant skin. Or he was sitting on the couch, with that strange man against his chest, their limbs intertwined with glasses of wine perched in their hands, staring lovingly into each other's eyes but waiting until the sun dipped below the horizon until the kissing began. Or possibly Sherlock was sitting alone, thinking about John just as John was thinking about him. Maybe he was sitting in the darkness, thinking about the strange man he had met in the doctor's office, wishing that he could somehow know the name of the mysterious being. John knew that Sherlock wouldn't go through such lengths to find him; John suspected that Sherlock wouldn't think to venture to social media, and if he did he wouldn't find anything. John didn't have any form of social media, especially not something as meager as Facebook that is. So how was Sherlock supposed to find him again? Well, by 'coincidence', that was how. John was going to accidentally run into him, maybe at his favorite coffee shop, maybe outside his front porch...but somehow he was going to find him. And it was all going to be some great mistake that was planned down to the last second, John was going to find that man and he was never going to know how or why, he was never going to know how John yearned for his body and soul, it would just be an accident. A beautiful, purposeful accident.

John couldn't sleep, of course he couldn't, he could feel the imprint on the mattress next to him, the elevation of the blankets if he rolled too far to his left. He could hear the breathing and feel the warmth of the devil that lay beside him, and he couldn't even bear to close his eyes now that he knew that there was another option. But he didn't need to be asleep to dream, in fact his thoughts conjured in the darkness were much more preferable to his dreams, because he could control everything that happened in his dreams. He saw himself and Sherlock, wrapped in each other's arms, he felt his skin, he heard his voice, he ran his fingers through his hair. And it was soft, it was soft like silk, and his skin was warm and smooth, his voice deep yet gentle, and his touch was careful, as though he didn't want to scare John away. His lips were loving and his kisses deep, and every move he made was as though he was doing some sort of beautiful dance, every motion was elegant and almost choreographed, and all John could do was cling to his chest and let his dull lips try to keep up. He was weak, he was numb, he was so love stricken that he felt as though he were on the verge of unconsciousness...but he wasn't. He wasn't there, he was with Sherlock. He was lying in bed, in the darkness, staring up into the shadows of his ceiling and wondering when he would finally get to lay in another bed and see another ceiling. John was wishing for a different view, a different place, a different heart. He longed to want to be closer to the person that lay next to him in the bed, not farther. He didn't want to hide from the fellow occupants of this house, he wanted to love them. But he knew that it wasn't possible, not unless Mary and Rosie were permanently replaced by Sherlock Holmes. John didn't even know this man, he knew nothing except he was beautiful and he was flirtatious and he was perfect. But he still loved him, because Sherlock could turn out to be the most malicious, most horrible man in the world and yet he would seem soft compared to Mary's wrathful nature. He would do anything, anything to live under Sherlock's iron fist rather than in Mary's chains. Anything would be better than Mary Morstan, anything at all. The sun rose long after John did, and as he sat at the counter, eating his lump oatmeal, he watched the light span over the kitchen, illuminating the white paint that seemed to have engulfed everything. It was a poor choice, white, especially for a kitchen. John could see every stain ever spilled, splashes on the cabinets, drips across the walls, all seemingly smudged and spread as Mary tried to scrub at them with a towel. But it was white, and it was inerasable, and john was forced to stare at the everlasting reminders of their kitchen disasters, all in one breakfast. His oatmeal tasted like sandpaper with a sprinkle of cinnamon, and yet he forced it down. He had missed dinner the previous night and he had to stay healthy, how could Sherlock love him if he was dead? No, he needed to stay strong, eat dispute his loss of appetite, smile dispute his inner misery, threatening to devour his very soul into darkness. He needed that light, Sherlock's' light, he needed it to soak into his skin and fight off his misery, like an angel come to defeat the Devil in Armageddon. John got up and washed his bowl before Mary and Rosie made their entrance, Mary dragging a very sleepily looking Rosie along by her hand.
"Do you want raisin toast this morning or just regular?" Mary was asking her.
"Raisin." Rosie grumbled, rubbing her eye with her little fist and glancing up at her father as he was making his way back upstairs.
"Did you already eat Daddy?" Rosie wondered in a more hopeful voice.
"Yes, I got up early." John said quickly, grabbing his laptop from the living room before running upstairs to avoid hearing any of their conversation. John propped his laptop up on the bed, displaying the picture of Sherlock against the brick wall, and stared at it for a long while. It stared back at him, and he couldn't help but smile, a true smile this time, not one conjured by hate and masquerades. John only wished that Sherlock could crawl out of that computer screen; he hoped that something good come from these hours of staring at the picture. Today was the day he found that man, today was the day he learned where and when to find the only man that mattered.