Ein Winterabend
Impromptu fic time! Because I haven't posted in a while, and churned out this little piece pretty quick tonight, and I think it turned out mostly all right ish? Good enough for what I was going for, in any case.
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Title: A Winter Evening
Pairing: John Watson/Mary Morstan
Rating: Oh gosh, G? PG at most.
Word Count: 823
Summary: Post-Reichenbach; John makes it home on a Bad Day.
Notes: Inspired the poem Ein Winterabend, by Georg Trakl - particularly, line 10: "Pain has turned the threshold to stone." - as seen by me in Martin Heidigger's essay Language, published in the Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism (second edition) and translated by Albert Hofstadter. An off-the-cuff, posted-at-three-in-the-morning kind of fic, so - not very refined or well-edited. Sorry. Please point out any glaring stupidities.
Disclaimer: I own neither the poem by Trakl, nor the English translation (presumably by Hofstadter). And of course, John and Mary belong to ACD, and Sherlock to GatFat and the BBC. I gain nothing.
Ein Winterabend / A Winter Evening, by Georg Trakl
Wenn der Schnee ans Fenster Fällt.
Lang die Abendglocke läutet,
Vielen ist der Tisch bereitet,
Und das Haus ist wohlbestellt.
Mancher auf der Wandershaft,
Kommt ans Tor auf dunklen Pfaaden.
Golden blüht der Baum der Gnaden
Aus der Erde kühlem Saft.
Wanderer tritt still herein;
Schmerz versteinerte die Schwelle.
Da erglänzt in reiner Helle,
Auf dem Tische Brot und Wein.
Window with falling snow is arrayed.
Long tolls the vesper bell,
The house is provided well,
The table is for many laid.
Wandering ones, more than a few,
Come to the door on darksome courses.
Golden blooms the tree of graces
Drawing up the earth’s cool dew.
Wanderer quietly steps within;
Pain has turned the threshold to stone.
There lie, in limpid brightness shown,
Upon the table bread and wine.
Some days are better than others.
It’s been some months since Sherlock’s death; enough that it takes John a moment to calculate the exact amount of time. (Four months, three weeks, and… a day.) Most of the time he’s all right; his new job at A&E is exciting, fulfilling - it gives him purpose again, a new kind of will. Now, when he has tea with Mrs Hudson at Baker Street, he doesn’t have to feign his delight at seeing her, so long as he avoids the upstairs flat. The memories have begun their transition from painful reminders of what no longer is, to fond remembrances of a man and a life he has accepted as no longer. Pints with Greg are cheerier than they used to be, and he’s dredged up just enough sympathy to spare a few words for Mycroft when he drops by.
And there’s Mary. God, yes, there’s Mary.
But no matter how good the good days are, that doesn’t stop the bad from coming. It doesn’t stop John from being forced to pass the graveyard because of roadworks the same day he forgets DI Dimmock’s name when he glimpses him across the street. It doesn’t stop it raining just as intermittently as it had That Day as he heads home from work, the infrequent drops in his hair beating regret into his skull and stopping him from picking up his phone for fear of the voice he’ll hear on the other end. He knows he has to get home, to his flat, to Mary, but as night falls and the rain turns into sleet, he knows that his course should be covered by a black coat and two pairs of sprinting feet, expensive black leather followed by trusty brown, wings on another madcap flight. It becomes harder and harder to put one foot in front of the other, a deep-seated sense of propriety the only thing stopping him from grinding to a halt in the middle of the street and letting his insides crumble into the black well gaping in his chest. There’s rust in his gears (grit on the lens, fly in the ointment), and he’s not sure how much further he can trudge when suddenly there’s a door in front of him and a key in his hand, and he finds himself in a simultaneously homely and unfamiliar building. He’s limping already, and the impossibility of the next four flights of stairs only makes his stomach plummet further. The sheer ignominy of taking the lift, though, barely makes his lip curl, and by the time he’s reached his door, he wants nothing more than to curl in on himself and disappear into his own emptiness.
He lets himself into the flat with quiet steps and a long, harsh breath. The door feels heavy, like the threshold is made of stone and catching on the wood, adding to the drag on his heels as he forces it shut behind him. He is met with the smell of another burnt pot, and can’t find it in himself to feel anything.
“I was going to make us butter chicken,” comes Mary’s voice from the kitchen, “but it came out a little, uh - inedible. But I took the sourdough out of the freezer, and there’s red wine on the table, so if you want to order out, we can -”
His forehead is resting against the door, and all he can see is darkened wood, but he can pinpoint the exact moment when she pops her head around the kitchen door and recognises the strained slump in his shoulders, the gaping black hole in his heart.
“Oh. Oh, John.”
She crosses the room on heavy feet. Off the oxygen today, but her hands are swollen and her breath stale when she reaches him; John absently resolves to do all the washing up.
Her arms come up around his shoulders and tug him close, and he buries his face in her neck, smelling sweat and curry and the plastic scent of medical equipment. She’s brought the dim, gold light of the kitchen with her, falling from her matted hair and t-shirt.
“And you were having such a good week…”
Outside, snow is falling, piling up against the windowpanes. John lifts one heavy hand to Mary’s waist and closes his eyes. He forces his thoughts away from phone calls and chases, and onto the meagre meal waiting for him.
He’ll wash and dry for Mary, he thinks as she rubs his back, and put it all away tomorrow morning. He’ll help clean up the burnt curry. He’ll drink red wine with buttered sourdough in the dim light of the kitchen, and remind himself that Sherlock Holmes died on his own terms, through his own will, and nothing, nothing could be a greater mercy than that.
He kisses Mary’s neck and doesn’t bother to fake a smile. The real ones will come soon enough.