Fic: Behavioural Modification - 3/5 (BBC Sherlock)
Title: Behavioural Modification
Rating: R
Wordcount: 4.4k this part, 23.7k overall
Warnings: Extremely dysfunctional behaviour, sexual acts, swearing. Spoiler: ramifications of past emotional abuse.
Beta: vyctori
Disclaimer: Do not own.
Summary: Whatever it took, he was going to make this work.
Step One: Acclimatize Subject
Step Two: Reward Behaviour
Step Three: Escalate Procedure
John was an honest, loyal man.
Oh, he was certainly capable of lying. He was even capable of lying well at times. As Sherlock knew what he looked like when he was doing it, deceit would be ineffectual in the extreme, but the point remained that John could lie.
John was also, he assumed, capable of betrayal. Any man in possession of a strong moral principle was. Doubtlessly Harry had considered herself betrayed by her brother in the past. An alcoholic sister after an alcoholic father? Oh, John would have surely done something. He was just as certain that while John would feel differently on the subject, the doctor would also admit to understanding his sister’s objections.
Therefore: John was an honest, loyal man who was capable of untruths and abandonment. He also possessed a sense of morality. A strong enough sense for Sherlock to depend upon, and that was rare. It was reasonable to assume that if John didn’t feel guilty, he hadn’t done anything he considered to be wrong.
This was the unfortunately tricky area. John had, after all, shot a cabbie with neither hesitation nor remorse. Generally speaking, that was a bit not good.
Generally speaking, cheating on one’s boyfriend was also a bit not good. Oh, certainly not to the same extent as killing a man, the general populace would try to insist, but John would think otherwise, depending on the dead man in question.
John had killed for him.
John wouldn’t cheat on him.
What, then, could John possibly be doing on a date with someone else? It made no sense.
The scenario: John, a woman, a restaurant. The woman was a fresh acquaintance and a Londoner rather than a commuter. The restaurant was of a respectable price range, judging by the jumper John had changed into. The hour and arrangement said date.
Except it couldn’t be.
John had left the flat in high spirits. He had made no attempt to hide his actions. He had gone so far as to make Sherlock a cup of tea before leaving. He had been deliberately open - a show of trust, well done, John, the progress was appreciated - as well as caring.
A date-like scenario, then, but with some other sort of prospect. With someone he had just met, the options were typically romance, sex, entertainment or information. Sherlock had claim to the first two and they had a telly for the third. Information, then. But what?
He needed more data.
Until John returned, he wouldn’t get any.
He played his violin rather than think, played until his arms ached more than his mind did. Regardless of the building burn beneath his skin, he kept at it, slashing at air and stabbing at sound. Improvisation took over, frustration in disjointed arpeggios and discordant key changes, anxiety in tremolo. He flipped the bow upside-down and played col legno, the sound as wispy and thin as the hairs on John’s stomach. Ire brought the hair back to the strings when he could no longer stand the resemblance; marcato persistence drove it into them. His fingers shifted, stretched, covered a fumble with a trill, and gave themselves over for the need of solid, harassed notes. Eyes shut, he surrendered himself to it, bending, twisting. He nearly stepped into the coffee table and hardly cared.
Flying spiccato gradually cooled into détaché strokes, harsh bounces of hair on string giving way to the melodrama of a smooth yet pausing stroke. Gliding legato took over entirely. He slurred his way through minor keys, properly wallowing. His hand was a creature of vibrato, shaking the music until the music shook it back. Violin pinned to his shoulder with his chin, he snapped his hand off the wooden neck and cracked his tiring fingers against his thigh, bow agitated into a return to open string chords.
He played, and he played, and by the time he realized John was listening from the doorway, he might as well have knelt down at the man’s feet and spoken his heart aloud.
Whirling away to face the window, he tore the bow from the strings and jerked the violin from his shoulder. The frog was tight in his right hand, the strings clenched into silence by his left. The muscles of his arms trembled. His back ached. He could feel the blood inside his fingers as it drew near the callused tips.
“John.”
His voice was hoarse. There was no reason for it.
Behind him, the doctor shifted his weight. Leaning against the doorframe before, standing unsupported now. No, one hand still on the frame. A light touch. Fingertips. Jacket open, eyes wide.
“God, Sherlock.”
John was breathless. There was no reason for that either.
The trembling in his arms spread to the rest of his body. He set his bow down while he was still capable of doing so gently. He bent to retrieve his rosin cloth from the case on the floor. Eyes open, back turned, he cleaned the strings and body.
“Are you putting it away?”
Sherlock turned.
John lowered his hand from the doorframe. He had been to an Italian restaurant. He had used the toilet there even though he hadn’t needed to, either because the table had been too small or the company too dull. He had not had dessert. Dull company, then. Not a date after all. Good, loyal John. He’d be hurt to know Sherlock had doubted him.
Sherlock said nothing and John said, “I’ve never heard you play like that. You don’t play like that when I’m here.”
“No,” Sherlock agreed. He didn’t. He didn’t feel like that when John was home. Or, more accurately, he didn’t feel that way about John when John was home.
“Oh, good,” John said, which made no sense. He hesitated, hand rising back to the doorframe. Entry, exit, on the edge of both. Left hand. Steady hand. “Do you mind if I listen? In here.”
Oh. He had misunderstood. Sherlock was stopping, he had already stopped playing.
He picked up his bow all the same. “What would you like?”
“What was that? That one you just played.”
“Do ut Des,” he picked at random. He’d never been able to fully delete all the Latin cluttering up his head. There were few things as appropriate as sacrifice and reciprocation.
“It was amazing.” Praise delivered as a statement of fact.
Sherlock shrugged.
“Is there another?” John asked.
“There can be.” He began to rosin his bow.
Four even steps brought John to his chair. He sat and gave his eyes over to Sherlock’s face. He added a smile. “What’s this one called, then?”
“Do ut Facias.”
“A series.”
“A progression.” He rosined slowly, giving John every opportunity to change his mind. He folded the rosin away into its cloth. He tuned the strings once more.
John waited for him, quiet, hands upon his thighs. His tongue peeked between his lips.
The bow kissed the strings. Hair and metal made love.
He dared the optimism of a major key and allowed his heartbeat to conduct. The tempo escalated.
Eyes closed from sight, ears full of sound, he knew when John shifted. When he leaned forward or settled back. He knew John. He knew John was his.
When he lowered the bow, John knew it too.
“That was....”
Staring up at him, John seemed to have forgotten how to speak. His blue eyes had darkened into a hazel illusion. His chest rose and fell, trapped by Sherlock’s dictation of rhythm. He was motionless, lost, and made no effort to hide his need.
Sherlock knelt at his case. Set down his violin. He loosened his bow. Tucked both away.
He lifted his eyes to John’s knees before he dared his face.
Their fear was identical. Of and for each other. It was in John’s eyes, his mouth, the small muscles beneath the skin of his cheeks.
The faded denim, soft under his palm, was warm from John’s knee, his thigh. Sherlock’s thumb studied the seam, stroked the threads in the cloth. John’s hands were trembling fists. Both of Sherlock’s palms on those knees now, his shins against the floor. Pressure, the slightest pressure, and John dropped his head back. Shallow breathing, flushed cheeks. Tension indicated pain. Constricted erection. Sherlock traced his fingertips up John’s thighs. John fumbled at the openings of his trousers. Small, rapid nods of the head, eyes tight shut. Desperation. A junkie afraid of the needle.
With the utmost care, Sherlock’s hands crossed his thighs, hips. He cupped John, fingers caught between man and seat. He pulled John closer, bent his head. Breathless, John cursed, a sigh of profanity. Legs spread, Sherlock between, as much as pants and trousers would permit. Sherlock tugged at the cloth and John lifted himself, hands gripping the armrests as if to break themselves.
He nosed at the hairs on John’s legs as he removed the man’s shoes. He studied skin with the flat of his tongue and rid him of his clothing as well.
Hand in his mouth, John made a broken sound.
Afraid.
Good. John thrived on fear.
The hem of the tan jumper had fallen across John’s lap. Sherlock lifted it, the back of his hand deliberate against John’s skin. He understood how to tease. He was no stranger to the demand for a sexual partner who was sexually interested. He was more than willing to provide that illusion. He licked his lips and bent his head and John choked on his name.
A decade away from regular practice, he attempted nothing too adventurous. Lick the shaft, suck the head, tongue the glans. Forearm across the stomach, hold him down.
It was more tiring than he’d remembered but also less undignified. He reached for John’s hand when he became tired of John muffling himself. John’s hand wasn’t shaking now. It was steady and it squeezed Sherlock’s tightly enough to hurt. His fingers ached from inside and out now, the symmetry pleasing.
Mouthing the side of John’s prick, Sherlock looked up.
John looked back.
Pupils blown, features tight and slack at once. These tiny, high sighs that broke when Sherlock breathed on him. Near-giggles of arousal. Somehow more endearing than the rest of it. The taste was unpleasant, the scent possibly worth it. He released John’s hand and pulled a pair of pubic hairs out of his mouth. Wiped them on John’s thigh before returning his lips to firm skin.
“Oh god. Please.”
Warm hands in his hair, holding, steering, not pulling. Acceptable. John slid down the chair toward his mouth, legs spread wide.
“Please.”
Sherlock swallowed him down.
John swore. Fuck and shit; anal intercourse, John inside him, straining muscles and leaving traces. Like that, more, harder; need, instruction. Want you, want you so bad; obvious. Gorgeous like this, god, your mouth; infatuation. Don’t stop; addiction.
Sherlock; love. Maybe. Close enough.
John’s testicles drew up and Sherlock pressed them down, thwarting ejaculation. John sobbed, twitching through orgasm. His palms pressed against Sherlock’s head, his fingers splayed outward to avoid hair-pulling. Wonderful John.
“Don’t stop. Oh god. Don’t stop.”
Of course not.
He drew back only enough to rest his jaw for a moment. Blew on wet skin. Used his hands and fingers and tongue. John jerked around him a second time, legs against his sides. His claim. His John. Established in saliva and semen on his chin.
A press of his face to John’s thigh, wiping his chin clean, then licking John’s skin clean as well. It diluted the taste somewhat. He nuzzled up to his lover’s crotch and repeated the service there. Delicately. John would be sensitive. One of John’s hands remained in his hair.
He laid his face on John’s thigh once again, this time keeping it there. The introduction then, the reality now. He breathed in the scent of satisfaction, breathed it in until his breathing was steady, his heartbeat slowing. Warm skin over hard muscle. He wanted to kiss it but felt the gesture would be a bit too much. Too much good could be a bit not good.
He nuzzled gently instead. Enough to make himself comfortable. Was his cheekbone digging into John’s leg? It might have been, but surely John was too lost in his post-orgasmic haze to care.
Once the haze began to fade, tension making its inevitable crawl back into John’s limbs, Sherlock closed his eyes rather than disturb John further. He ignored the protest of his spine. Judging by the degree of the ache, five minutes had already elapsed. He would remain limp. Remain here. He’d earned this. If John thought otherwise, Sherlock would make him see reason.
John touched his upturned cheek. He slid the backs of his fingers across his face and into his hair. Sherlock hummed appreciatively, sure John would feel the vibration of his throat against his thigh.
The muscles beneath his cheek tightened, the tension lifting his face a marginal distance. Tension, but of a different sort. It was heavy in a way which could only be subjectively measured.
A light touch across his ear travelled down his jaw. Fingertips beneath his chin, urging him to lift his face. Sherlock merely looked up, too content for movement.
What he saw.
John.
John.
John was kissing him. John was bent in half, hands clasped about Sherlock’s face as if he were a thirsty child seizing a cup. The taste of his mouth was a welcome reprieve from the taste of his semen and Sherlock availed himself of it to the fullest. John rumbled. John pushed him back and clambered out of the chair after him. John pushed him back and pushed him down and climbed on top of him, his John with a jumper and jacket and no trousers.
Some squirming was required to keep his legs from being trapped beneath his body. Once accomplished, he sprawled out on the floor, devoid of qualms. John’s kisses were hard. His lips left no question of the teeth beneath them. John’s knees framed his hips, his hands pinned his shoulders. Even Sherlock’s feet were under John’s chair.
Oral fixation at last put to good use, John sucked on his tongue, captured it, stroked it with his own. Mine. Sherlock held the sides of his jacket. His. He had never kissed like this. Never been kissed like this. Not as necessity, never as more than compromise. John kissed as if he never meant to stop. John kissed until Sherlock was hazy and content, and then he kept going.
His left hand dipped beneath Sherlock’s jacket, smoothing the fabric of his shirt across his chest, wrinkling it, bunching it. His ribs seemed to be a point of interest. His breastbone. His nipples. The exploration was dragged out, instantaneous. John pulled his mouth away with a comical popping sound and bit his neck. A muscle in Sherlock’s back jolted, jerking him against the floor. John began to lick, tonguing his way to an ear. Uncomfortably damp, it almost tickled.
His right hand alternated between Sherlock’s shoulder and the floor. Pinned, trapped, claimed; the term was irrelevant. The importance was in the sense of conclusion. They were here. They had reached this point. John’s arm tired. Hand and knees put too much distance between their bodies at any rate. John removed his mouth, rearing up, kneeling over, not quite sitting on. Sherlock’s neck was wet and slightly chilled and John fumbled at the buttons of his shirt. Flushed, beautiful. So plain. So simple. So misleading.
Sherlock stroked the bare lengths of his thighs, the curve of his arse. The jumper preserved only a fraction of his modesty and therefore none at all. He was half-hard, bouncing slightly, ridiculously. Curious, Sherlock squeezed his arse to make him moan. John’s eyes fell shut. His head fell back. His mouth fell open. He pressed into Sherlock’s hands, ground needlessly against his crotch.
And froze.
“It’s all right,” Sherlock said. “I don’t mind.”
“You’re not hard,” John said.
“Obviously.”
John stared down at him, a warm weight on his body and under his hands. The hem of his jacket brushed against Sherlock’s wrists. His eyes had never been so wide. “Why?”
“It’s sexuality, not a medical condition.” There was no need for concern.
“No,” John said. He shook his head, stared at him again. “No, you.”
“Full sentences, John.”
John climbed off him, making a grab for his jeans in the same motion. Without him, the floor was cold. He darted behind his armchair and dressed there, his motions surprisingly unsteady.
Sherlock sat up. “Full sentences,” he repeated, and he loathed repeating himself. “Communication is key.” Oh, he wished he hadn’t said that. Each time Victor had said that, Sherlock had hated him a little. “I would also add that I am well-intentioned and you shouldn’t hate me for it.”
“‘Well-intentioned’,” John echoed. “You- What. Sherlock, you just blew me and you don’t even-you’re not-” He cut himself off, physically turning away to keep his remarks at bay.
Too late. Sherlock was already shot through with humiliation. “Oh, is that what I was doing with your penis in my mouth? I had wondered. It certainly explains all the semen, thank you for clearing that up.” He crossed his legs and settled into a sulk. This wasn’t working the way it was meant to. Why wasn’t it working? And why now? Why did John mind now?
“Sherlock. What the fuck.” Jeans secured, John picked up his pants from the floor and shoved them into his pocket. Idiocy. That was going to chafe, particularly with the remains of an erection. “You didn’t even want to.”
“I didn’t mind.” He wasn’t going to say he’d wanted to. It would give the wrong connotations. He didn’t want the indignity or the taste. He wanted the contact and control, the ability to turn the neat doctor into a mess. “Besides, you wanted me to.”
“I didn’t ask!”
“Please,” Sherlock scoffed. “It was obvious.”
“But,” John said, “I never asked.”
Wrong. “You told me not to stop. Last week, too, you said you wanted to fuck me. Which is still on the table, by the way, if you avoid my prostate.” He paused. “And as long as it isn’t a literal table.” It was best to be clear about these things.
John’s mouth worked.
“It’s fine. There’s no need to be so self-sacrificing. Some people have libidos and you’re one of them. I understand.”
“Like hell you do!” John was shaking. His shoulders, his fists. Not the spasm in the back of his left hand, a different tension. He recoiled, stepping back behind his armchair. “Don’t touch me! Stop touching me!”
His hand halted.
Had he been reaching?
He ran his hand through his hair, ruffling it forward and back. “I don’t mind,” Sherlock told him impatiently. John’s stupid morality. “It’s all the same to me. I don’t care one way or the other.” As long as he could touch John. As long as they could return to the kissing and John marvelling at him and calling him brilliant. Because when this transpired, it felt very much as if John loved him, as if he’d already been trained into it. It didn’t matter if John loved him or not as long as Sherlock felt as if he did. He needed that.
“I care,” John said and that was good. No, wait. Conversation, not internal monologue. Focus. That was bad.
“Then what do you want?”
“None of it,” John said.
“You’re lying,” Sherlock noted.
“I want you to stop touching me.”
“You’re still lying.”
“Sherlock!” John yelled. The two syllables of the ridiculous name contorted his face. “I need you to stop. How’s that? I need - need - you to stop. Please. It’s not fair.”
“I’ve already said I don’t mind.”
“To me!” John yelled again. “It’s not fair to me!”
Sherlock frowned. “Now you’re just being ridiculous.”
John bent down, straightened, and chucked his shoe at Sherlock’s head.
He blocked involuntarily, arms crossed over his face. It struck his left elbow. “Domestic violence, John!” he bellowed at the man’s retreating back.
“Don’t start!” John warned, not so much as turning his head as he climbed the stairs to his room.
“No, of course not! You have already!”
But John wouldn’t be baited back. He wasn’t like Mycroft, always needing to deprive him of the last word. He wasn’t terribly much like Victor either, so capable of twisting verbal abuse on its head and bringing Sherlock to his knees. John was finished. John slammed his door and dragged a chair across the floor to it.
Sherlock continued to sit.
He looked at the ceiling.
He resumed his previous horizontal position on the floor and looked up at the ceiling again.
He chewed on his lip.
John had a gun up there.
After eighteen minutes, there was a tentative step on the stairs. Not from John’s room, from below.
“Yes, Mrs. Hudson?” he called.
“I’ve brought some biscuits, dear,” she answered from the hall. “Sherlock, are you- Where are you?”
“Floor.”
She popped her head in. “Oh. There you are.”
“Yes.”
“Would you like some biscuits?”
Flimsy excuse. Welcome company.
“Give them to John,” he said.
“Sherlock.” A coo of endearment. Maternal. Worried.
“John isn’t angry with you,” he explained. “If he sees you, he’ll calm down.”
“All right....” She came inside the sitting room anyway. Set the plate down on the table and picked up the flag pillow from John’s armchair. She knelt down next to him and tucked it under his head, forcing him to lift up for her. She smoothed his curls off his forehead. “Comfortable?”
“Yes, Mrs. Hudson.”
She bit her lip. “You know....” she said.
“I didn’t mean it,” he told her, shifting his head to better look her in the eyes. “John’s trained. He could incapacitate me in a number of ways, but he threw a shoe at me and aimed poorly. Once you give him the biscuits, he’ll feel terribly guilty for even that. Then neither of us has to apologize.” It evened out wonderfully. Mummy had always said mutual wronging meant both of them ought to apologize, but Sherlock had only ever subscribed to that theory with the aim of causing Mycroft further suffering.
“If you’re sure,” she allowed. “But, Sherlock, you know.” She tapped her hip, the history behind its stiffness.
“John isn’t abusive.”
“I mean more than just John, dear.”
Sherlock smiled tightly up at her. Like knew like, but they were congruent in shape, not identical in size. He could fit into places that could never be meant for Mrs. Hudson. He could even enjoy them. If he enjoyed them, they weren’t mistakes. Nothing was good or bad but thinking made it so.
“Right, well,” she said. “I enjoyed your violin tonight.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Hudson.”
“I particularly enjoyed the reasonable hour you played it at.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Hudson.”
She sighed and took John the biscuits.
Sherlock stayed on the floor. He woke in the morning with a blanket across his body and John’s shoes nowhere in sight.
It had been so simple.
Shaking in the flat after pulling off rain-drenched layers, John had pressed a mug into his hands. Sherlock had put his face into the steam and groaned.
“Did you just have an orgasm?” John asked. “Because I’ll admit, my tea is very good.”
Sherlock had glared at him.
John had sipped his own tea. Considered. “No, not quite orgasmic. Shame. You get to have all the fun.”
“Why?” he asked, willing to play the game. “You want one too?”
John shrugged. “Wouldn’t say no.”
He hadn’t, either. He’d said “what are you doing” and “Christ, yes, your hands are hot.” Sherlock had said “don’t spill” and John ejaculated and laughed and said “too late.”
Sherlock drank the rest of his tea, watching John over the rim until the man had flushed and turned and changed into dry clothes upstairs. John had returned, nervous and eager to please. “Would you like another, then?” he’d asked. Licked his lips and smiled.
“Yes,” Sherlock had said, handed John his mug, and received a laugh. He remembered to add “thanks” as he took his turn to dry and change. John had given him a full mug when he returned and looked at him expectantly, but Sherlock had already thanked him. His focus had swung back to the case moments later, his body filled with another man’s warmth.
He’d been so happy.
The shoes were gone. John had come. John had seen Sherlock lying where he’d put him but hadn’t done anything about it. Cursing himself for the lapse, for actually falling asleep now of all times, Sherlock threw the blanket onto the couch and tracked John’s movements through the flat that morning. Early that morning. The sun had yet to rise.
At some point before the present and well after midnight, John had come downstairs. He had encountered a dark room and nearly stepped on Sherlock in recovering the thrown shoe. That made the blanket obviously Mrs. Hudson’s doing, and from before midnight. Yes, it smelled of her detergent. If Sherlock and the blanket on the floor were unexpected, John’s trip down for his shoes had been his first venture outside his room since he’d barricaded himself in. He hadn’t made breakfast.
If John had intended to stay at 221b for the morning, he wouldn’t have risked argument by retrieving his shoes. The shoes were a clear indicator that John had gone somewhere. At this hour, where would that be?
He went upstairs to John’s empty room, opened the door, and saw the unthinkable.
The bed was unmade.
Sherlock threw open the closet. He searched to the bottom. John’s bag was gone.
He counted empty hangers, recalled how long it had been since John had last done laundry, and arrived at a significant figure. John was packed for five days. More precisely, John was packed to the capacity of his bag.
He bent over, yanked them off, and threw both of his shoes at the closet.
It didn’t help.
Step Four
Rating: R
Wordcount: 4.4k this part, 23.7k overall
Warnings: Extremely dysfunctional behaviour, sexual acts, swearing. Spoiler: ramifications of past emotional abuse.
Beta: vyctori
Disclaimer: Do not own.
Summary: Whatever it took, he was going to make this work.
Step One: Acclimatize Subject
Step Two: Reward Behaviour
Step Three: Escalate Procedure
John was an honest, loyal man.
Oh, he was certainly capable of lying. He was even capable of lying well at times. As Sherlock knew what he looked like when he was doing it, deceit would be ineffectual in the extreme, but the point remained that John could lie.
John was also, he assumed, capable of betrayal. Any man in possession of a strong moral principle was. Doubtlessly Harry had considered herself betrayed by her brother in the past. An alcoholic sister after an alcoholic father? Oh, John would have surely done something. He was just as certain that while John would feel differently on the subject, the doctor would also admit to understanding his sister’s objections.
Therefore: John was an honest, loyal man who was capable of untruths and abandonment. He also possessed a sense of morality. A strong enough sense for Sherlock to depend upon, and that was rare. It was reasonable to assume that if John didn’t feel guilty, he hadn’t done anything he considered to be wrong.
This was the unfortunately tricky area. John had, after all, shot a cabbie with neither hesitation nor remorse. Generally speaking, that was a bit not good.
Generally speaking, cheating on one’s boyfriend was also a bit not good. Oh, certainly not to the same extent as killing a man, the general populace would try to insist, but John would think otherwise, depending on the dead man in question.
John had killed for him.
John wouldn’t cheat on him.
What, then, could John possibly be doing on a date with someone else? It made no sense.
The scenario: John, a woman, a restaurant. The woman was a fresh acquaintance and a Londoner rather than a commuter. The restaurant was of a respectable price range, judging by the jumper John had changed into. The hour and arrangement said date.
Except it couldn’t be.
John had left the flat in high spirits. He had made no attempt to hide his actions. He had gone so far as to make Sherlock a cup of tea before leaving. He had been deliberately open - a show of trust, well done, John, the progress was appreciated - as well as caring.
A date-like scenario, then, but with some other sort of prospect. With someone he had just met, the options were typically romance, sex, entertainment or information. Sherlock had claim to the first two and they had a telly for the third. Information, then. But what?
He needed more data.
Until John returned, he wouldn’t get any.
He played his violin rather than think, played until his arms ached more than his mind did. Regardless of the building burn beneath his skin, he kept at it, slashing at air and stabbing at sound. Improvisation took over, frustration in disjointed arpeggios and discordant key changes, anxiety in tremolo. He flipped the bow upside-down and played col legno, the sound as wispy and thin as the hairs on John’s stomach. Ire brought the hair back to the strings when he could no longer stand the resemblance; marcato persistence drove it into them. His fingers shifted, stretched, covered a fumble with a trill, and gave themselves over for the need of solid, harassed notes. Eyes shut, he surrendered himself to it, bending, twisting. He nearly stepped into the coffee table and hardly cared.
Flying spiccato gradually cooled into détaché strokes, harsh bounces of hair on string giving way to the melodrama of a smooth yet pausing stroke. Gliding legato took over entirely. He slurred his way through minor keys, properly wallowing. His hand was a creature of vibrato, shaking the music until the music shook it back. Violin pinned to his shoulder with his chin, he snapped his hand off the wooden neck and cracked his tiring fingers against his thigh, bow agitated into a return to open string chords.
He played, and he played, and by the time he realized John was listening from the doorway, he might as well have knelt down at the man’s feet and spoken his heart aloud.
Whirling away to face the window, he tore the bow from the strings and jerked the violin from his shoulder. The frog was tight in his right hand, the strings clenched into silence by his left. The muscles of his arms trembled. His back ached. He could feel the blood inside his fingers as it drew near the callused tips.
“John.”
His voice was hoarse. There was no reason for it.
Behind him, the doctor shifted his weight. Leaning against the doorframe before, standing unsupported now. No, one hand still on the frame. A light touch. Fingertips. Jacket open, eyes wide.
“God, Sherlock.”
John was breathless. There was no reason for that either.
The trembling in his arms spread to the rest of his body. He set his bow down while he was still capable of doing so gently. He bent to retrieve his rosin cloth from the case on the floor. Eyes open, back turned, he cleaned the strings and body.
“Are you putting it away?”
Sherlock turned.
John lowered his hand from the doorframe. He had been to an Italian restaurant. He had used the toilet there even though he hadn’t needed to, either because the table had been too small or the company too dull. He had not had dessert. Dull company, then. Not a date after all. Good, loyal John. He’d be hurt to know Sherlock had doubted him.
Sherlock said nothing and John said, “I’ve never heard you play like that. You don’t play like that when I’m here.”
“No,” Sherlock agreed. He didn’t. He didn’t feel like that when John was home. Or, more accurately, he didn’t feel that way about John when John was home.
“Oh, good,” John said, which made no sense. He hesitated, hand rising back to the doorframe. Entry, exit, on the edge of both. Left hand. Steady hand. “Do you mind if I listen? In here.”
Oh. He had misunderstood. Sherlock was stopping, he had already stopped playing.
He picked up his bow all the same. “What would you like?”
“What was that? That one you just played.”
“Do ut Des,” he picked at random. He’d never been able to fully delete all the Latin cluttering up his head. There were few things as appropriate as sacrifice and reciprocation.
“It was amazing.” Praise delivered as a statement of fact.
Sherlock shrugged.
“Is there another?” John asked.
“There can be.” He began to rosin his bow.
Four even steps brought John to his chair. He sat and gave his eyes over to Sherlock’s face. He added a smile. “What’s this one called, then?”
“Do ut Facias.”
“A series.”
“A progression.” He rosined slowly, giving John every opportunity to change his mind. He folded the rosin away into its cloth. He tuned the strings once more.
John waited for him, quiet, hands upon his thighs. His tongue peeked between his lips.
The bow kissed the strings. Hair and metal made love.
He dared the optimism of a major key and allowed his heartbeat to conduct. The tempo escalated.
Eyes closed from sight, ears full of sound, he knew when John shifted. When he leaned forward or settled back. He knew John. He knew John was his.
When he lowered the bow, John knew it too.
“That was....”
Staring up at him, John seemed to have forgotten how to speak. His blue eyes had darkened into a hazel illusion. His chest rose and fell, trapped by Sherlock’s dictation of rhythm. He was motionless, lost, and made no effort to hide his need.
Sherlock knelt at his case. Set down his violin. He loosened his bow. Tucked both away.
He lifted his eyes to John’s knees before he dared his face.
Their fear was identical. Of and for each other. It was in John’s eyes, his mouth, the small muscles beneath the skin of his cheeks.
The faded denim, soft under his palm, was warm from John’s knee, his thigh. Sherlock’s thumb studied the seam, stroked the threads in the cloth. John’s hands were trembling fists. Both of Sherlock’s palms on those knees now, his shins against the floor. Pressure, the slightest pressure, and John dropped his head back. Shallow breathing, flushed cheeks. Tension indicated pain. Constricted erection. Sherlock traced his fingertips up John’s thighs. John fumbled at the openings of his trousers. Small, rapid nods of the head, eyes tight shut. Desperation. A junkie afraid of the needle.
With the utmost care, Sherlock’s hands crossed his thighs, hips. He cupped John, fingers caught between man and seat. He pulled John closer, bent his head. Breathless, John cursed, a sigh of profanity. Legs spread, Sherlock between, as much as pants and trousers would permit. Sherlock tugged at the cloth and John lifted himself, hands gripping the armrests as if to break themselves.
He nosed at the hairs on John’s legs as he removed the man’s shoes. He studied skin with the flat of his tongue and rid him of his clothing as well.
Hand in his mouth, John made a broken sound.
Afraid.
Good. John thrived on fear.
The hem of the tan jumper had fallen across John’s lap. Sherlock lifted it, the back of his hand deliberate against John’s skin. He understood how to tease. He was no stranger to the demand for a sexual partner who was sexually interested. He was more than willing to provide that illusion. He licked his lips and bent his head and John choked on his name.
A decade away from regular practice, he attempted nothing too adventurous. Lick the shaft, suck the head, tongue the glans. Forearm across the stomach, hold him down.
It was more tiring than he’d remembered but also less undignified. He reached for John’s hand when he became tired of John muffling himself. John’s hand wasn’t shaking now. It was steady and it squeezed Sherlock’s tightly enough to hurt. His fingers ached from inside and out now, the symmetry pleasing.
Mouthing the side of John’s prick, Sherlock looked up.
John looked back.
Pupils blown, features tight and slack at once. These tiny, high sighs that broke when Sherlock breathed on him. Near-giggles of arousal. Somehow more endearing than the rest of it. The taste was unpleasant, the scent possibly worth it. He released John’s hand and pulled a pair of pubic hairs out of his mouth. Wiped them on John’s thigh before returning his lips to firm skin.
“Oh god. Please.”
Warm hands in his hair, holding, steering, not pulling. Acceptable. John slid down the chair toward his mouth, legs spread wide.
“Please.”
Sherlock swallowed him down.
John swore. Fuck and shit; anal intercourse, John inside him, straining muscles and leaving traces. Like that, more, harder; need, instruction. Want you, want you so bad; obvious. Gorgeous like this, god, your mouth; infatuation. Don’t stop; addiction.
Sherlock; love. Maybe. Close enough.
John’s testicles drew up and Sherlock pressed them down, thwarting ejaculation. John sobbed, twitching through orgasm. His palms pressed against Sherlock’s head, his fingers splayed outward to avoid hair-pulling. Wonderful John.
“Don’t stop. Oh god. Don’t stop.”
Of course not.
He drew back only enough to rest his jaw for a moment. Blew on wet skin. Used his hands and fingers and tongue. John jerked around him a second time, legs against his sides. His claim. His John. Established in saliva and semen on his chin.
A press of his face to John’s thigh, wiping his chin clean, then licking John’s skin clean as well. It diluted the taste somewhat. He nuzzled up to his lover’s crotch and repeated the service there. Delicately. John would be sensitive. One of John’s hands remained in his hair.
He laid his face on John’s thigh once again, this time keeping it there. The introduction then, the reality now. He breathed in the scent of satisfaction, breathed it in until his breathing was steady, his heartbeat slowing. Warm skin over hard muscle. He wanted to kiss it but felt the gesture would be a bit too much. Too much good could be a bit not good.
He nuzzled gently instead. Enough to make himself comfortable. Was his cheekbone digging into John’s leg? It might have been, but surely John was too lost in his post-orgasmic haze to care.
Once the haze began to fade, tension making its inevitable crawl back into John’s limbs, Sherlock closed his eyes rather than disturb John further. He ignored the protest of his spine. Judging by the degree of the ache, five minutes had already elapsed. He would remain limp. Remain here. He’d earned this. If John thought otherwise, Sherlock would make him see reason.
John touched his upturned cheek. He slid the backs of his fingers across his face and into his hair. Sherlock hummed appreciatively, sure John would feel the vibration of his throat against his thigh.
The muscles beneath his cheek tightened, the tension lifting his face a marginal distance. Tension, but of a different sort. It was heavy in a way which could only be subjectively measured.
A light touch across his ear travelled down his jaw. Fingertips beneath his chin, urging him to lift his face. Sherlock merely looked up, too content for movement.
What he saw.
John.
John.
John was kissing him. John was bent in half, hands clasped about Sherlock’s face as if he were a thirsty child seizing a cup. The taste of his mouth was a welcome reprieve from the taste of his semen and Sherlock availed himself of it to the fullest. John rumbled. John pushed him back and clambered out of the chair after him. John pushed him back and pushed him down and climbed on top of him, his John with a jumper and jacket and no trousers.
Some squirming was required to keep his legs from being trapped beneath his body. Once accomplished, he sprawled out on the floor, devoid of qualms. John’s kisses were hard. His lips left no question of the teeth beneath them. John’s knees framed his hips, his hands pinned his shoulders. Even Sherlock’s feet were under John’s chair.
Oral fixation at last put to good use, John sucked on his tongue, captured it, stroked it with his own. Mine. Sherlock held the sides of his jacket. His. He had never kissed like this. Never been kissed like this. Not as necessity, never as more than compromise. John kissed as if he never meant to stop. John kissed until Sherlock was hazy and content, and then he kept going.
His left hand dipped beneath Sherlock’s jacket, smoothing the fabric of his shirt across his chest, wrinkling it, bunching it. His ribs seemed to be a point of interest. His breastbone. His nipples. The exploration was dragged out, instantaneous. John pulled his mouth away with a comical popping sound and bit his neck. A muscle in Sherlock’s back jolted, jerking him against the floor. John began to lick, tonguing his way to an ear. Uncomfortably damp, it almost tickled.
His right hand alternated between Sherlock’s shoulder and the floor. Pinned, trapped, claimed; the term was irrelevant. The importance was in the sense of conclusion. They were here. They had reached this point. John’s arm tired. Hand and knees put too much distance between their bodies at any rate. John removed his mouth, rearing up, kneeling over, not quite sitting on. Sherlock’s neck was wet and slightly chilled and John fumbled at the buttons of his shirt. Flushed, beautiful. So plain. So simple. So misleading.
Sherlock stroked the bare lengths of his thighs, the curve of his arse. The jumper preserved only a fraction of his modesty and therefore none at all. He was half-hard, bouncing slightly, ridiculously. Curious, Sherlock squeezed his arse to make him moan. John’s eyes fell shut. His head fell back. His mouth fell open. He pressed into Sherlock’s hands, ground needlessly against his crotch.
And froze.
“It’s all right,” Sherlock said. “I don’t mind.”
“You’re not hard,” John said.
“Obviously.”
John stared down at him, a warm weight on his body and under his hands. The hem of his jacket brushed against Sherlock’s wrists. His eyes had never been so wide. “Why?”
“It’s sexuality, not a medical condition.” There was no need for concern.
“No,” John said. He shook his head, stared at him again. “No, you.”
“Full sentences, John.”
John climbed off him, making a grab for his jeans in the same motion. Without him, the floor was cold. He darted behind his armchair and dressed there, his motions surprisingly unsteady.
Sherlock sat up. “Full sentences,” he repeated, and he loathed repeating himself. “Communication is key.” Oh, he wished he hadn’t said that. Each time Victor had said that, Sherlock had hated him a little. “I would also add that I am well-intentioned and you shouldn’t hate me for it.”
“‘Well-intentioned’,” John echoed. “You- What. Sherlock, you just blew me and you don’t even-you’re not-” He cut himself off, physically turning away to keep his remarks at bay.
Too late. Sherlock was already shot through with humiliation. “Oh, is that what I was doing with your penis in my mouth? I had wondered. It certainly explains all the semen, thank you for clearing that up.” He crossed his legs and settled into a sulk. This wasn’t working the way it was meant to. Why wasn’t it working? And why now? Why did John mind now?
“Sherlock. What the fuck.” Jeans secured, John picked up his pants from the floor and shoved them into his pocket. Idiocy. That was going to chafe, particularly with the remains of an erection. “You didn’t even want to.”
“I didn’t mind.” He wasn’t going to say he’d wanted to. It would give the wrong connotations. He didn’t want the indignity or the taste. He wanted the contact and control, the ability to turn the neat doctor into a mess. “Besides, you wanted me to.”
“I didn’t ask!”
“Please,” Sherlock scoffed. “It was obvious.”
“But,” John said, “I never asked.”
Wrong. “You told me not to stop. Last week, too, you said you wanted to fuck me. Which is still on the table, by the way, if you avoid my prostate.” He paused. “And as long as it isn’t a literal table.” It was best to be clear about these things.
John’s mouth worked.
“It’s fine. There’s no need to be so self-sacrificing. Some people have libidos and you’re one of them. I understand.”
“Like hell you do!” John was shaking. His shoulders, his fists. Not the spasm in the back of his left hand, a different tension. He recoiled, stepping back behind his armchair. “Don’t touch me! Stop touching me!”
His hand halted.
Had he been reaching?
He ran his hand through his hair, ruffling it forward and back. “I don’t mind,” Sherlock told him impatiently. John’s stupid morality. “It’s all the same to me. I don’t care one way or the other.” As long as he could touch John. As long as they could return to the kissing and John marvelling at him and calling him brilliant. Because when this transpired, it felt very much as if John loved him, as if he’d already been trained into it. It didn’t matter if John loved him or not as long as Sherlock felt as if he did. He needed that.
“I care,” John said and that was good. No, wait. Conversation, not internal monologue. Focus. That was bad.
“Then what do you want?”
“None of it,” John said.
“You’re lying,” Sherlock noted.
“I want you to stop touching me.”
“You’re still lying.”
“Sherlock!” John yelled. The two syllables of the ridiculous name contorted his face. “I need you to stop. How’s that? I need - need - you to stop. Please. It’s not fair.”
“I’ve already said I don’t mind.”
“To me!” John yelled again. “It’s not fair to me!”
Sherlock frowned. “Now you’re just being ridiculous.”
John bent down, straightened, and chucked his shoe at Sherlock’s head.
He blocked involuntarily, arms crossed over his face. It struck his left elbow. “Domestic violence, John!” he bellowed at the man’s retreating back.
“Don’t start!” John warned, not so much as turning his head as he climbed the stairs to his room.
“No, of course not! You have already!”
But John wouldn’t be baited back. He wasn’t like Mycroft, always needing to deprive him of the last word. He wasn’t terribly much like Victor either, so capable of twisting verbal abuse on its head and bringing Sherlock to his knees. John was finished. John slammed his door and dragged a chair across the floor to it.
Sherlock continued to sit.
He looked at the ceiling.
He resumed his previous horizontal position on the floor and looked up at the ceiling again.
He chewed on his lip.
John had a gun up there.
After eighteen minutes, there was a tentative step on the stairs. Not from John’s room, from below.
“Yes, Mrs. Hudson?” he called.
“I’ve brought some biscuits, dear,” she answered from the hall. “Sherlock, are you- Where are you?”
“Floor.”
She popped her head in. “Oh. There you are.”
“Yes.”
“Would you like some biscuits?”
Flimsy excuse. Welcome company.
“Give them to John,” he said.
“Sherlock.” A coo of endearment. Maternal. Worried.
“John isn’t angry with you,” he explained. “If he sees you, he’ll calm down.”
“All right....” She came inside the sitting room anyway. Set the plate down on the table and picked up the flag pillow from John’s armchair. She knelt down next to him and tucked it under his head, forcing him to lift up for her. She smoothed his curls off his forehead. “Comfortable?”
“Yes, Mrs. Hudson.”
She bit her lip. “You know....” she said.
“I didn’t mean it,” he told her, shifting his head to better look her in the eyes. “John’s trained. He could incapacitate me in a number of ways, but he threw a shoe at me and aimed poorly. Once you give him the biscuits, he’ll feel terribly guilty for even that. Then neither of us has to apologize.” It evened out wonderfully. Mummy had always said mutual wronging meant both of them ought to apologize, but Sherlock had only ever subscribed to that theory with the aim of causing Mycroft further suffering.
“If you’re sure,” she allowed. “But, Sherlock, you know.” She tapped her hip, the history behind its stiffness.
“John isn’t abusive.”
“I mean more than just John, dear.”
Sherlock smiled tightly up at her. Like knew like, but they were congruent in shape, not identical in size. He could fit into places that could never be meant for Mrs. Hudson. He could even enjoy them. If he enjoyed them, they weren’t mistakes. Nothing was good or bad but thinking made it so.
“Right, well,” she said. “I enjoyed your violin tonight.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Hudson.”
“I particularly enjoyed the reasonable hour you played it at.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Hudson.”
She sighed and took John the biscuits.
Sherlock stayed on the floor. He woke in the morning with a blanket across his body and John’s shoes nowhere in sight.
It had been so simple.
Shaking in the flat after pulling off rain-drenched layers, John had pressed a mug into his hands. Sherlock had put his face into the steam and groaned.
“Did you just have an orgasm?” John asked. “Because I’ll admit, my tea is very good.”
Sherlock had glared at him.
John had sipped his own tea. Considered. “No, not quite orgasmic. Shame. You get to have all the fun.”
“Why?” he asked, willing to play the game. “You want one too?”
John shrugged. “Wouldn’t say no.”
He hadn’t, either. He’d said “what are you doing” and “Christ, yes, your hands are hot.” Sherlock had said “don’t spill” and John ejaculated and laughed and said “too late.”
Sherlock drank the rest of his tea, watching John over the rim until the man had flushed and turned and changed into dry clothes upstairs. John had returned, nervous and eager to please. “Would you like another, then?” he’d asked. Licked his lips and smiled.
“Yes,” Sherlock had said, handed John his mug, and received a laugh. He remembered to add “thanks” as he took his turn to dry and change. John had given him a full mug when he returned and looked at him expectantly, but Sherlock had already thanked him. His focus had swung back to the case moments later, his body filled with another man’s warmth.
He’d been so happy.
The shoes were gone. John had come. John had seen Sherlock lying where he’d put him but hadn’t done anything about it. Cursing himself for the lapse, for actually falling asleep now of all times, Sherlock threw the blanket onto the couch and tracked John’s movements through the flat that morning. Early that morning. The sun had yet to rise.
At some point before the present and well after midnight, John had come downstairs. He had encountered a dark room and nearly stepped on Sherlock in recovering the thrown shoe. That made the blanket obviously Mrs. Hudson’s doing, and from before midnight. Yes, it smelled of her detergent. If Sherlock and the blanket on the floor were unexpected, John’s trip down for his shoes had been his first venture outside his room since he’d barricaded himself in. He hadn’t made breakfast.
If John had intended to stay at 221b for the morning, he wouldn’t have risked argument by retrieving his shoes. The shoes were a clear indicator that John had gone somewhere. At this hour, where would that be?
He went upstairs to John’s empty room, opened the door, and saw the unthinkable.
The bed was unmade.
Sherlock threw open the closet. He searched to the bottom. John’s bag was gone.
He counted empty hangers, recalled how long it had been since John had last done laundry, and arrived at a significant figure. John was packed for five days. More precisely, John was packed to the capacity of his bag.
He bent over, yanked them off, and threw both of his shoes at the closet.
It didn’t help.
Step Four