Fic: Reinventing DI Lestrade
Title: Reinventing DI Lestrade (1/3, complete)
Author: rev02a
Rating: R
Warnings: Offscreen death, discussion of suicide, language, POST TRF story
Pairings: Lestrade/hiswifeOC, John/Sherlock, Lestrade/Mycroft
Word Count: 7,743
Summary: Seven months after Sherlock's death, Greg Lestrade begins to put his life together.
The superintendent claimed his hands were tied, but his bluster proved just how angry he was. And Greg knew how it would all end.
He had dreamed of a big retirement party: streamers, cake, useless trinkets provided by his subordinates. Instead, on a regular Wednesday, he tendered his resignation and boxed up his office.
He knew that Donovan was satisfied. He trained her, after all, and when Sally Donovan had decided something was right or wrong, she would make it happen. As far as she was concerned, Sherlock Holmes was guilty, and, in some small respect, so was DI Gregory Lestrade.
Megan tried to be supportive, she really did. Their marriage, already long strained, was not holding up well against this new development.
She was marking papers in the dining room, the piles of essays spread all over the table top like columns of soldiers readying for war. She stared at a page and took to the sentences with a bright green pen and vengeance.
“We’ve been over passive voice,” she growled, as she scribbled a note into the margin of the student’s work. Greg smiled, sadly. Sherlock had said something about a P.E. teacher around Christmas time. Greg shook that thought away and entered the dining room.
Megan held up a hand and continued to mouth along with the sentence she was reading. Fifteen years of marriage to a Language Arts teacher and Greg knew this dance. He watched the way her eyes tracked her reading and the way her pen hovered, waiting to correct something. Once finished with the paragraph, she looked his way.
“I thought I’d take Ellen and Connor--” he began, but she interrupted.
“Connor has football this afternoon, he should be out the door any minute. Ellen has to practice. Don’t let her talk you out of it; she’s not touched that piano all week,” Megan adamantly replied.
Greg smiled, “You and I could--”
“Greg,” she sighed and dropped her pen in exasperation, “I’ve taken up three assignments this week and have just finally gotten to look at them. If I stop now, I’ll be weeks before I can get back to them.”
Greg smiled again, tired. “I was thinking maybe at the end of term we could go on holiday--”
Megan sighed again before running her hand through her hair, “We just went on holiday. I know that big case went to your head, but surely you remember Spain? We spent a week and a fortune there?”
The very mention of “that big case” made Greg grimace. Moriarty. Holmes. Of course, it was like salt in a raw wound.
“Of course, darling,” he answered, trying for light. “I just enjoyed being with my family--”
“Greg!” Megan looked completely exasperated. “Connor spent the whole time on his iPod and Ellen got sun poison the first day. I got that bloody stomach bug and stayed the whole week in the toilet. What holiday are you remembering?”
He licked his lips. She continued, “I know you’re not doing so well right now, but I have to work and you need to...find a hobby or something. Maybe a new job?”
He grimaced and staged a retreat from the dining room. This conversation was quickly becoming one they replayed day and again. Financially, they would be fine for a few months, but then he would need to seek employment. A disgraced detective inspector who fell for the ruse of Sherlock Holmes...or so they all said.
It was a fine day, so once the piano practice had commenced and the football cleats were located, Greg took himself on a walk.
His stroll led him to an Underground station and into the city. Until, somehow, he found himself on Baker Street.
Mrs. Hudson answered the bell and apologized profusely. “Oh detective!” she gushed, “John’s moved out. Couldn’t handle it, the poor love. He’s found some little place, but my new boarders, Chad and Lindy, are quite nice. Much more quiet than Sherlock ever was! Why they--” and so she rambled on.
The woman was clearly lonely. Greg didn’t doubt that she felt that she had lost two sons with Sherlock’s death. Why, the three of them were often together--she was pleased to hear of their adventures, but the way she spoke of John now, it was more like an estranged son-in-law than her own child.
Yes, of course she’d checked in on dear Doctor Watson; heartbroken the poor lamb was without Sherlock. Just like he’d been when he first moved in--all quiet and solemn. She worried sometimes that she’d call on him and find him hanged weeks before (no one to check in on him, since he moved. No family to speak of, except his alcoholic sister, who was good for nothing).
Upon this declaration, there was little to talk him out of it, and Greg acquired the address.
Another few Tube changes and Greg found himself in a more run down side of Brixton. Cheaper rent for an unemployed doctor, he noted, even if the crime rate was far higher than Baker Street would ever dream of being. The flat building had no buzzers or locked doors, so Greg simply let himself into the building. The hallway smelled of urine and curry; the smells that Greg had always associated with domestic disputes.
John answered immediately, however, when Greg knocked. “Greg,” he greeted softly and let the man in.
The new flat was, as far as he could determine, a closet. The bed was merely inches from the lino that delineated the kitchen--which was a hot plate for a hob and a kettle. The flat wasn’t decorated like 221B had been. The walls were bare and stark, but bore the scratches of past tenants. John didn’t seem embarrassed.
Instead, he studied Greg. John looked at Greg’s hands and trousers for such a long time that a tingle at the base of Greg’s stomach spread through his being--the same feeling Greg had whenever Sherlock looked at him. John was observing.
“How are you?” John asked, as polite as ever.
Greg pasted on a smile, “Oh, as well as can be!”
John returned the smile, but it looked even more fake on his face. “How’s retirement suiting you?”
Greg laughed, and rubbed a hand over his face, “I could ask the same of you.”
John shook his head before glancing at his watch. An awkward silence descended. The tenants of the flat above were listening to some depressing pop music and it swelled into the room. John grimaced.
Greg looked at the other man and frowned. No one could say that Sherlock’s suicide was anything less than graphic. To put it bluntly, John had held up far better than Greg could have. Even still, he was pale. He seemed to be fading away, even there. It pained Greg.
He should have come around before this. The man was clearly grieving, and he could use a friend. It was important to have a connection to the real world when someone was in this sort of grief. Otherwise, it could become all encompassing.
“I’m not dying,” John interrupted, looking at Greg with a knowing expression. “I miss him. I miss him more than I thought...”
He took a shattered breath before pasting on the fake smile again. It looked like it hurt to fake. “Anyway, I’m off to work soon.”
Greg rubbed his hands together. “Of course, of course. I was just in the neighborhood and thinking maybe--” Greg cleared his throat. John continued to study Greg. “Anyway, we should get together. Pub or some such.”
John nodded.
Greg ran the conversation through his head again, "You're going to work? Aren't you...retired?"
John laughed, darkly and nothing like himself. Greg frowned. John walked the scant steps past the bed to a chest of drawers, before he stopped at turned to face Greg again.
“Sometimes, everyone sees what you don't. I didn't know, not until he was gone. Then, then it was like I couldn't breathe. I've lost friends, but never my best friend. Then, after a while, I realized that I loved him." John laughed bitterly. Greg wondered about making a break for it. Obviously, the man's grief had finally given him clarity into what Greg himself had always seen, but Greg wasn't sure he should hear this.
"Just knowing that I'd denied what everyone else saw, I needed something. I have to do something or I will kill myself,” John admitted and Greg nearly grabbed his mobile. He still had Mycroft Holmes’ number; they could arrange some sort of 24 hour surveillance or care or--
“Then I knew that I couldn’t keep doing the things that would help those who turned on him. Everyone,” John’s voice was suddenly harsh and restricted, “who believed in him one moment attacked him the next. Past clients. Friends. Anyone who could give information into backing Moriarty’s bullshit. They got their fifteen-seconds and their payout.”
John turned his back to Greg and braced his arms on the drawer he opened. It appeared to be the only thing keeping him on his feet.
“And I got...nothing. I am alone. I decided,” his voice trembled, “that there wasn’t really anything worth staying around for. Mrs. Hudson is cared for, Sherlock saw to that. So I could just...go.”
Greg felt paralyzed. He had assumed that Mycroft bloody Holmes who had his nose in everybody’s business would be looking after John.
“I was going to jump, just like Sherlock. It was night, late, late at night, and I was on a bridge and this man, a homeless guy, stopped me. Knew my name. Knew Sherlock. Begged me to stay alive, because Sherlock didn’t like needless death.”
Greg wanted to look away, because John’s stiff, bent back told him more about the man’s mental state than any words could. He continued to listen and look, because someone needed to.
“He was right. Sherlock wanted me...he always wanted me safe. He would get so frustrated and play his violin all night if I was hurt on a case. He would try to make me happy then. He’d buy the milk or bring the papers up to the flat for me--nothing big, but that was Sherlock.”
John took long, deep breaths before he stood army straight again. He drew a doctor’s bag from the drawer. He pulled a pair of rucksacks from beneath the bed and, when he stood, looked at Greg.
“I had to look after them--his Homeless Network. Sherlock wasn’t around to help them anymore.”
Greg didn’t ask any further questions, but when John set out to meet with Sherlock’s homeless gang, he went along.
The Tube wasn’t full and people didn’t pause to make eye contact when they made their stop. The streets here were dirty and littered with broken glass and rubbish. John didn’t stop, however, he just led Greg around the chain link fences and graffitied walls to a small office. People lingered on the corners and watched them with unease.
The building had been yellow once, but the paint was chipped and peeling now. John produced a ring of keys and he unlocked the grate in front of the door. He rolled it up with ease before unlocking the door.
The office was tiny. It had a small reception area with a tiny desk and chair directly inside the door. Four plastic chairs lined one wall, while a giant cupboard with multiple lockers adorned the other. Further inside was another room with an exam table. John flipped on the lights in each room before he pulled a white coat from the back of the door in the second room.
John set his bags on the counters in the exam room and waved Greg in.
“I had a break in some weeks ago. I can’t keep the meds here anymore.” He gestured to the rucksack. “Unpack that, yeah?”
Greg felt like he was moving underwater. John hung a stethoscope around his neck and hid the now empty bags beneath the sink. There was a knock at the door.
John smiled, nearly a real smile this time, and answered the door.
“Hello, Greta,” he welcomed as an older woman, bundled in dirty coats, entered.
“Hello, Doctor Watson,” she returned, already moving to the cupboard by the door. She unlocked the biggest shelf and placed her rucksack and bed roll inside.
“Please, Greta,” he laughed, politely, “please call me John.”
She rolled her eyes and returned, “Of course, Doctor Watson.”
Greg stared at her. He knew he recognized her.
“Oh, hello, Inspector Lestrade,” she said upon seeing him. “I’m Greta.”
And it clicked. “Greta Oldsman?”
She smiled, sadly. “I see you remember me, then?”
The case, he remembered, of course, and, therefore, by proxy, he remembered her. A young girl had died in hospital. The parents accused the nurse on call, a sixty-three year old woman, retired Army nurse turned civilian nurse trainer, of murder. The case looked open-shut. Only, Sherlock proved that wasn’t the truth.
“Verdict overturned, then?” he asked, resigned.
“You know how it went,” she admitted, weary. “Mr. Holmes saved so many people. No one saved him when Moriarty went after him, though.”
She pulled off her multiple layers of coats and placed them into the cupboard before locking it. Then, she passed them both and headed into the exam room. Greg heard her turn on the tap and begin scrubbing her hands and arms.
The glass was cloudy and impossibly to see out of, but John stared blindly out the far window. Inside the exam room, the tap turned off and Greta emerged.
“They got you in the end, too, I see,” she noted, as she dried her hands on a paper towel.
Greg stared at her, bewildered. “You’re a nurse. Living on the street.”
Greta shrugged. “My husband, bastard of a man, lost his reputation, or so he said. Sued me for everything I had. I stayed with my sister for a while, but people are only so forgiving. My license was revoked. I love medicine, though, and at least when I’m sleeping rough, I can look after the kids. Doctor Watson here is an angel.”
John continued to stare out of the cloudy glass, but frowned.
Greta touched John’s shoulder and he sighed. “I begged her to stay with me,” he admitted. “She’s just damn stubborn.”
“You get me a shower from time to time, I appreciate that,” Greta replied, kindly.
There was a rap on the door and John straightened. “Showtime. Greg, I need you to get names of the folks coming in and offer them a locker and key when they’re in the exam room. Most of them will be kids--their parents are working for the day and they just need to warm up. The kettle’s in the desk there,” John instructed.
Greta smiled, “There’s hot cocoa for the kids and tea, of course. They get a voucher for a meal from a little place down the road once they have their exam. If any of them warn you that a particular person is coming, let us know. The crazies pop by, time to time.”
The stream of people were unwashed, but humble. Some Greg recognized from the drunk tank or loitering charges, some sold the Big Issue, and some were just coming for human contact.
John met each one with a solemn nod and the entreaty to call him John.
Every one of them called him Doctor Watson.
The children came with scrapes and blisters--although one little boy came with a dog who had a cut foot.
John took it all in stride and, with Greta’s help, bandaged, coddled, and cared. Greg found himself on guard, like his nights on the Beat, but strangely relaxed. For, with each cough or ear infection, came a story of an interaction with Sherlock Holmes.
“Oh, Mister Holmes was right rude. Yeah, he was a rude bugger--but he helped me when I needed him.”
“Mister Holmes, God rest his soul, saved my boy Henry from the coppers. They says he stole a car--my Henry can’t drive none!”
“Mister Holmes used to buy smack, you know? Came down long time back and used to be a regular. When he got clean, he got me clean too. I got a job now.”
John just listened. It didn’t seem to help him, really, but it was balm to Greg’s soul. He knew he could trust the detective--genius or not. To hear these stories, the ones that the papers would never have listened to, some of the hard knot of grief and disappointment lessened.
John did, however, seem to be nearly ready to weep when people told stories about how Sherlock saw him.
“Mister Holmes never let nobody hurt Doctor Watson. Hell, back in November there was that guy with that knife. Liam said that guy took a fucking swing at Doctor Watson and Mister Holmes about killed him.”
“Doctor Watson was asking questions about that lost kid and he got so cold Mister Holmes gave him his gloves. Took ‘em right off his hands. I told ‘em, I said, you know you lose fingers if you ain’t careful. Mister Holmes said a doctor’s hands were more important. I says he musta been right. Doctor Watson fixed my lip after I got in a fight down with Handy Dan.”
Greg caught Greta’s eye when the last patient told a story on the duo of Holmes and Watson. Greta shook her head and touched Greg’s shoulder.
“He and I are so alike, you see. We lost everything to Moriarty. He went after my husband in every avenue available to him. He did the same to Sherlock. Doctor Watson, you--we were all just causalities in that war,” she noted. She unlocked her designated cupboard and began pulling on a wool jumper.
“Greta,” John interrupted, as he hung up his white lab coat, “I would like to offer you a proposition. I could convert this into a small flat. You could stay here--”
“No, John,” she said, softly. He seemed to deflate at the use of his name.
“It would keep the vandals away--” he argued, nearly defeated.
“How would an old lady keep them out, Doctor Watson?” she asked, as she zipped up her coat.
John smiled, and teased, “You’re feisty enough.” She hefted her rucksack onto her shoulder.
“Please, Greta. Winter is coming.”
Greta locked her cupboard and settled her rucksack on her shoulders. “Who would look after those kids who are sleeping rough, doctor? They need me.”
John crossed his arms, “I could build a bunk. I’ll buy the next shop over. You can run a boarding room for the kids--”
“And how am I going to keep the drugs and booze out, doctor? I’m a little old thing. A washed up nurse--”
“Damn it!” John roared, suddenly showing just a flash of the passion he used to exude every day. “I’m a useless doctor who the army didn’t even want any more! You have ten times the--”
Greta held up her gloved hand and John stopped mid-rant. “Goodbye, Doctor Watson. I will see you tomorrow. Good to see you again, detective.”
And she closed the door politely behind her when she left. John dropped into the chair that Greg had occupied for most of the day.
Greg leaned on the desk and took in the tiny clinic. “Are you considered a NHS doctor still?”
John laughed, nearly hysterically. “God knows. I got this place as a Christmas present from Mycroft. He wanted to give me more, but it was already such an improvement. Before then, I was doctoring with a folding table in an alley.”
Greg leaned back at looked at the ceiling, “Knowing Mycroft, you’re an actual clinic.”
Both men laughed. John rubbed his face and stood stiffly. He pushed the chair under the desk and walked into the exam room. He pulled the rucksack from under the sink and began to refill it for the trip home. Greg grabbed the remaining bags and followed suit.
“You should get a car. It’s not safe carrying all this,” he noted.
“I can’t drive,” John replied. “Plus, any car down here would get broken into. I’d need a chauffeur and a bodyguard for the car.”
“Maybe Mycroft will get that for your birthday,” Greg mused. John chuckled. Greg zipped up the bag in front of him. “You do this everyday?”
John shrugged, “I take Wednesday and Saturdays off. Even then, if somebody’s ill enough, I get house calls.”
Greg lifted an eyebrow. “You left 221B because of that?”
John stared at the rucksack before him, “Of course not.”
Greg nodded and shouldered the bag. “Does it help, being away, then?”
John rubbed his thumb over the rucksack’s fabric. “No, of course not. London is, and always will be, his city. He knew every street, every Thai place. He bled for London.” John laughed humorlessly, “I still don’t know why, but he jumped for London too.”
Greg wanted to comfort John somehow, but instead, he led John out of the exam room and switched off the lights. He accompanied John from locking up to the Tube, and all the way back to his flat.
“So what time should I be here tomorrow?” Greg asked, after placing the bag in the drawer. John looked up sharply. “You need a receptionist, apparently, and I need something that isn’t wondering if my wife is shagging her coworkers over their tea break.”
John looked at Greg for a long time before he cleared his throat. “I open about ten. If it’s cold I open when I wake up. Greta will be there as soon as she hears the grate open.”
Greg nodded. “See you at nine thirty then?”
John stared at Greg before he nodded.
Greg took the Tube home and found Megan watching a Torchwood rerun on the sofa. He leaned down and kissed her temple. She flinched--just minutely. Greg told her about his day, but she seemed more interested in watching John Barrowman’s antics.
He went to bed.
That night, he dreamed that John was standing on a bridge, ready to jump. A crowd of dirty homeless people stood behind, watching. Greg ran, shouting for John to stop, but John just sighed and said, “I can’t win, Greg. Moriarty already did.”
Greg sat up when John stepped off the ledge. He wiped the sweat off his neck and struggled to catch his breath. Megan slept on, her back turned to him.
He got up and wandered around his home. He watched Connor and Ellen sleep. Connor slept in a tight ball with his knees tucked into his Rooney jersey and the duvet kicked off the bed. Greg pulled the covers back over his son and watched the boy sleep. Nearly nine, and still a shrimp of a kid. Ellen slept like she was fighting. Even as he watched, she rolled and kicked her legs. A horde of stuffed toys littered the bed and floor, all witness to the girl’s attempts at rest.
Greg took his vigil back to his own bedroom. Megan snored softly, but never once rolled toward him. When they were first married, she slept tucked into his chest with her head on his shoulder. As the babies came, she slept with her legs thrown over his, but nearly horizontal across the bed. Then, years past and his career became more demanding. He slept at his desk or on the sofa downstairs. Sometimes, when the kids were still small and shared a room, she would find him asleep on the floor between their beds.
But justice was a demanding mistress and his marriage slowly fell apart. Greg saw more of Sherlock Holmes’ bony arse than his wife’s. Now wonder it suddenly became: Megan and the piano teacher; Megan and her assistant teacher; Megan and the neighbor.
It killed him. He begged her to give their marriage another go. She said she would try if he would. He cut hours. He gave interesting cases to Donovan. He had dinner with his family. He went to football games and piano recitals. He quit smoking. Again.
Megan remained cold and disbelieving. She never expected his sudden devotion to his family to last. At Christmas he had honestly believed that they could make an honest go of it. He wondered now. Unable to come to a satisfying answer, he turned his thoughts to his friend.
John Watson, unassuming, short doctor who could reign Sherlock Holmes in with a few simple words. How vibrant and alive he had once seemed. Now, he just seemed grey.
He turned his mobile phone over in his hand. Then he sent a text.
John is not in a good way. -Greg
He didn’t expect a reply. Mycroft Holmes was far too busy to text an unemployed detective inspector.
He’s better than he was. Thank you. MH
Greg stared at the screen of his mobile for a long time before he sent a reply.
I think he’s waiting for a reason to give up.
The reply was longer in coming, this time.
Gregory, I charge you, if you ever respected my brother: do not let that happen. MH
Greg set his phone aside, slightly angry and insulted. His phone alerted him to another incoming message, however, so he took it up again.
Please. Keep John safe. For Sherlock. MH
Greg rubbed his face from forehead to chin.
I will do my best.
Once the message informed him that it was sent, Greg thumbed a second message.
How do you take your coffee? -Greg
John replied almost instantly.
BLACK
Greg smiled. For such a complex man, he seemed to want for so little.
Any requests for breakfast?
NOT MUESLI
Greg shook his head and settled back on the couch. He grabbed the remote and flicked through the channels until he settled on an old episode of Doctor Who.
CHANGED MIND. WILL MEET AT YOUR HOUSE AT 0930, OK???
The message was strange. Why would John be concerned about Greg seeing his flat again? At the same time, it was a simple request.
See you tomorrow.
Part Two