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John knew something was wrong. He just did. Sherlock had been quiet for over an hour, sitting by the desk with his head in his hands, fluffing his hair in frustration every few minutes.
It would be nothing unusual if it were one of his sulks on the sofa, bored, with no interesting case in sight. This time, however, they were in the middle of investigating a murder, or so Sherlock had deemed it after taking one glance at the corpse previously assessed to be a suicide.
John was making tea, but his eyes kept darting to his flatmate, helplessness eating him raw. He wished he could help, but when he’d offered it just moments before, Sherlock snapped at him before returning to his sulk. Therefore, he decided there was only one thing that could help an Englishman in such distress. Tea.
He stirred in the sugar for Sherlock and made his way into the sulk corner. Standing next to his flatmate, John worried his lower lip with his teeth before tapping Sherlock on his shoulder.
“I made you tea.”
Sherlock released a grunt that John took as ‘thanks’, but he didn’t look up.
“What’s happening? Any progress?”
Another grunt, dismissive this time.
“You know you can tell me, whatever it is,” John said in what he hoped was a soothing voice as he moved the chair to face Sherlock better, still leaning back, giving him space. At the same time, he tried to assume an open posture, with his hands apart on the table and his body relaxed, as per the training he’d received years ago.
Sherlock sighed, his shoulders rising and falling before he finally lifted his head to look at John. His eyes were bloodshot, his face pale and lips pulled into a straight line. A pang of worry twisted John’s gut at the sight.
“You can’t solve it? It happens, maybe it’s too—”
“Oh John… how I envy you.” Uh oh, that was Sherlock’s snarky tone of voice.
“What?” John asked, his hands on his hips. He was willing to endure a bit of attitude from his friend, but even he had limits.
“I solved it yesterday.”
“Oh well, then great. Right? Who killed Liam McCarthy then?”
“It’s not the who that’s the problem, it’s the why,” Sherlock answered cryptically. Of course, he’d have to make John work for it.
“Drink your tea and tell me.” John pointed at the mug rather forcefully. Sherlock opened his mouth as if to argue but he must have seen the ‘I’m not letting this one go’ written on John’s face. “Tea first.”
With an eye-roll, Sherlock made a show of taking a sip from his mug, and to John’s utter delight, his face smoothed into a tiny expression of content for just a blink of an eye.
“I knew it wasn’t a suicide from the moment I saw the body. Now, I wish I hadn’t.” He took another sip. This stalling technique was quite unusual. Sherlock should have rattled off his deductions and look smug about it by now. At the sight of a distraught Sherlock John armed himself with patience to find out what was really going on in that brilliant head. Sherlock nibbled on his bottom lip as he lifted his gaze to John’s. “It was Maggie, his girlfriend.” The reveal came out as if it brought pain to Sherlock for some reason, but John played it cool.
“Okay then. And she staged it as a suicide?” John asked, his eyes never leaving Sherlock.
“Yes. I found her and talked to her last night.” Sherlock looked into his tea as if he could read the answers to whatever was troubling him in it.
“What? Where?” This was news to John, but explained Sherlock’s sudden disappearance at a relatively late hour the day before.
“It’s not relevant.” He swirled the tea in his mug, miraculously not spilling a single drop. “She’s an addict. Clean now, but you never stop being an addict.” Lifting his gaze, he captured John’s, and John heard his breath catch at the honest conflict swirling in his friend’s eyes. “I’d know,” Sherlock said with harsh sincerity.
John swallowed hard, nodded in acknowledgement and listened to the rest of the story.
“Liam was older than her and she was a gullible girl who trusted the wrong man. The romantic fling turned into a nightmare when he got her addicted to heroin and kept her locked at his house. For months, no one knew where she was; her family was looking for her, as was the police. She tried running away several times and, as you can imagine, he didn’t appreciate that. Once he found her and dragged her back, he… used her. Against her will.” Sherlock’s voice was at the edge of breaking and John’s palms hurt from the grip he had on the chair he was sitting on, wishing it was Liam’s neck. Sherlock took another sip of the tea then pushed the mug aside in disgust, clearly not at the drink but at the story that unravelled. “After that, she knew it was her life or his. The dates and timeline of her story match the police reports from the time she was pronounced missing. The marks on her wrists and neck damn him even further, proving what he did to her. She had to be hospitalised, and I used your login to check her records. The things he did to her, John…”
Sherlock shook his head, his upper lip twitching in a snarl that matched the violent fury coursing through John as well.
“She begged him for it at one point,” Sherlock continued. “Begged him for the drugs. Because that’s what addiction does to you. You become this body-less entity and all you think about is when’s the next hit. Not who it’s coming from, not how you’re going to get it, and not the consequences of taking it. All you need is that high that will calm every twitch and scratch, every itch inside you, even if just temporarily.”
Sherlock spoke calmly, but John could hear the truth in his voice and how Maggie’s situation hit close to home. Images of Sherlock in a drug den filled John’s mind, of young Sherlock begging for a hit after he ran away from home. John shook the sinking feeling the vision gave him off when Sherlock spoke again.
“During all this, she still kept her wits and planned his murder,” he said with near admiration in his tone. “Because that’s what it was. Quite possibly, she would have spent years at his house, chained to the radiator before anyone would find her. Dead or alive. She managed to fight for herself, escaped without anyone’s help, and took her life into her own hands. The resilience in her, John, is commendable. If Scotland Yard learns of this, you know what’ll happen to her.”
“She’d go to prison. Quite possibly for life,” John said, understanding Sherlock’s dilemma.
“Because she saved herself from a monster,” he concluded in a near-whisper.
John never knew how and why Sherlock started taking drugs in the past, but the pain in his eyes as he relayed the events of Maggie’s life, told him that there might be more parallels in their stories than he’d care to admit.
“Give me your phone,” John said, making sure his tone bore no place for argument.
Sherlock fished the device from his trouser pocket and placed it in John’s waiting palm. John’s thumbs tapped the screen carefully before he turned the device around for Sherlock to see.
I was mistaken. It was a suicide after all. SH
“Should I send it? I’m fine with doing that and never talking about it again. Unless you’d want to.” John’s hand didn’t shake when his finger hovered over the send button.
Sherlock thrust his chin up and stippled his fingers under it, his eyes closing for a brief moment before snapping open to land on John.
“Send it.”
John clicked on the ‘send’ arrow and somewhere in Scotland Yard, Greg received a text message that may have saved a young woman’s future. At the same time making Sherlock, and by extension, John, guilty of withholding evidence.
In front of John sat a consulting detective, a man with a brilliant mind and a big ego. A man whose compassion and heart remained hidden to anyone who didn’t dare to look close enough. Sherlock had raised a wall of snark and brusqueness around himself, but to John, he sometimes revealed the big heart he hid under tight shirts and a fancy coat.
At that moment, sat in front of John was the Empathetic Detective whom John treasured and would risk his life to protect.