Sherlock & John (A Teenlock Fanfiction)

Chapter Sixty - The Call

Coffee went well. John noticed that she had pretty dark blue eyes and bright pink lips. He'd never payed attention to the minimal makeup she wore... he always just thought that's how girls looked. But Mary was different. She asked him if he could do this again, sometime. John said, "Yeah, sure," and didn't kiss her when he dropped her off at the house.

As soon as he got to his flat, John sat in the kitchen and stared at the home phone attached to the wall quietly, like it was going to advance upon him.

He was really, really afraid of calling.

Truly, disgustingly afraid.

Because if Sherlock didn't answer - if the voice on the other end of the line wasn't his, he'd know.

But if he did answer, if there was a mishap, a fluke, maybe he didn't know it was John, maybe the number change threw him off...

If he did answer, what then?

John still loved him. God, that was stupid. But he did. He couldn't eject it out of his heart.

But if Sherlock answered...

Would he even be Sherlock? Was John even John anymore?

So instead of calling, he applied for some colleges, sitting down, with his laptop directly in front of him, typing hurriedly away. Putting down that he served in the Armed Forces for almost four years as Lieutenant Colonel would put those angry admissions officers to rest.

He stared at his blog, and his appointed therapist, Mrs. Thompson, who had a soft voice, and a quiet demeanor, urged him forward. "I think writing down everything that happens to you will honestly help you."

John grimaced. "Nothing happens to me."

"Go out a bit. Have fun, John."

"But I don't want to have fun, I can't-"

"John..." Mrs. Thompson wrote something down in thick black ink.

"You just wrote that I have trust issues."

"And you just read my writing upside down." She sighed. "See what I mean?"

John looked away uncomfortably, surveying the cool beige room. It had a house plant in a seemingly random place; it was fake, of course.

"Find someone who knows what you're going through."

"Okay, I'll try."

"That's your homework."

"I have homework, eh?"

"Yep."

John paid for the transaction at the front desk.

John tried out some support groups. So many long monologues about people dying... It was so tiresome. John was bored of people dying. He hated it when people died. That's why he'd wanted to become a doctor. He even tried talking to Mary about it, but the angst was drawn on her features in Sharpie marker.

He could just call. He could just pick up the phone, and call.

So that's what he resolved to do.

He confronted the telephone one Saturday morning, watching it like a hawk, hoping Mrs. Hudson wasn't judging him because he was so afraid of a little phone attached to the wall. He stepped towards it. Then back. And then up again, suddenly, gathering all of the strength he'd saved after four years.

"867-5309," he said, punching in the numbers, and then he picked up the phone shakily.

The response was immediate.

"The number you have dialed is not a working number. Please check the number and dial again."

John called twice, hoping he'd made a mistake.

"The number you have dialed is not a-"

"Shit," John grumbled, slamming the phone into the receiver, and then picking it up to re-call. "Shit."

This is futile.

"Eight six seven," he growled, "five three oh nine."

Stop, John.

"The number you have-"

"Shit," John gasped, hanging up and then picking the phone back up again. He recalled.

You're losing it, John, the number doesn't work.

"The n-"

He's dead.

"No."

"The-"

He killed himself that night.

"No."

Stop calling.

"T-"

He's dead, John.

"Shit."

"The numb-"

He's dead.

"God fucking dammit!" John yelled, walking into the living room and grabbing a loaded gun from a drawer in his desk. It was black, and cold, and heavy - John weighed it in his hands for one angry moment before cocking it and pointing it at the phone in the kitchen.

"That." He shot.

"Stupid." He shot again.

"Fucking." Third time.

"Blue eyed." Fourth.

"Pompous." Fifth.

"Fucking." Sixth.

"Arsehole."

John shoved another cartridge in and shot at the phone until Mrs. Hudson came screaming up the stairs, only to find him crumpled on the floor.

"I couldn't save him," he whispered, staring deadly at the bullet riddled phone no longer attached to the wall. "I couldn't save Harry, or Violet, or David, or Mum... or Sherlock. I couldn't save Sherlock."

Mrs. Hudson worriedly gathered up her skirts and sat down next to John. He had a stripe of red skin where the hot barrel of the gun burned into his arm, and she patted it gently.

"I'm sorry," she said. "It's hard when people die."

"It doesn't matter. He's... Sherlock Holmes... my best friend, my... my... it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. He's dead."

"Yes, it does. I'm sure Sherlock is waiting for you."

John looked up at her, and sighed. "I would find that to be a much more comforting prospect if I wasn't tired of waiting for him."

A/N: so yeah uh well uh uh two more (short) chapters left and I wonder if anyone wondered why I didn't mark that it was John's POV in the beginning huh well okay bye