Praising Thy Worth
title: Praising Thy Worth
fandom: Sherlock Holmes Movieverse (could be book as well)
Pairing: Holmes/Watson Slash
rating: R (sexual content)
words: 3,788
summary:Watson feels unappreciated, so, naturally, Holmes disproves this in the most inconvenient way possible.
author's note: Thanks to paperclipbitch, taconaco and avalonauggie where thanks is due, as it so rightly is.
One day, John Watson entertained the thought that he was not actually of any importance to his companion Sherlock Holmes.
The events leading up to Watson coming to this conclusion are as follows: Holmes, in an effort to get Watsons attention, pursed his lips together and blew through them, producing a whistling sound. Only as Watson started to make his exit of the room, in his own effort to make it known to Holmes how much he disapproved of such a tactic, did he notice the body of Gladstone, his dear little dog, lying prone on the carpet.
“Not to worry,” Holmes called to him. “He isn’t dead! Just... resting.”
Watson didn’t respond right away. The last pieces of the puzzle he didn’t even know, until that very instant, he had been trying to solve had finally clicked into place, and he was just then coming to the seemingly monumental conclusion that, in his companions most revered esteems, he was of no more use than Gladstone, and all he was good for was eating dropped food and then filling a room with noxious fumes.
Yes, Holmes took Watson with him on every one of his cases, and on some of these he was able to put his rather exceptional combat skills to actual detective-saving use; such occasions led Watson to believe that he was, in fact, quite relevant to Holmes’ detecting needs. Rarely did he miss a target, and his skills with a firearm proved very useful to his companion. But surely if he was not on hand with his revolver, Holmes wouldn’t be able to pursue his cases in ways that would require the use of guns at all. As it were, since shootouts seemed to occur with disturbing regularity, Watson doubted Holmes’ skills at solving cases any other way.
However, Watson was not particularly gifted in the crime solving department. He had no head for deductions, try as Holmes might to nurture his attentiveness to the relevance of the most minute details which Watson could never seem to wrap his mind around. He also was well versed in Holmes’ distaste for the unintelligent, and if he could not keep up with Holmes’ brilliant mind, what, according to that brilliant mind, was he good for?
Thus came the dilemma, for even though Watson rarely caught onto Holmes’ leads without the detective having to literally spell the mysteries out for him, Holmes often shared his findings with him. This led Watson to believe that Holmes might not know the answers himself, which was a rare occurrence indeed. But, alas, when all was said and done, these queries proved to be merely a source of amusement for Holmes, as if to assure himself that, yes, he truly was a genius, to whose intellect no others’ could compare.
And yet, despite all this, Holmes still insisted that Watson always be with him, and would go to extraordinarily immature lengths to get him to concede. This made it difficult for Watson to come to his particular conclusion, for he considered just letting go and forgetting he wanted to say anything at all in remembering how Holmes would deliberately forget his revolver, or feign concern about his particular ventures, things that never failed to get Watson to drop whatever he was doing and dive headfirst into the inevitable danger.
But then Holmes whistled at him. As if he were a dog, as if he were Gladstone, and Watson found himself no longer able to control himself.
“So that’s it, then,” he snapped, as he whipped around to meet the cause of his tremendous frustration face to face. “I’m just your dog?”
“Excellent deduction, friend, although I must tell you that it is rather an inaccurate one,” Holmes said, and damn it all, he was smirking. “I do love it when you guess, though. Hypotheses so often lead to verity, as you well know.”
“Don’t be smart with me,” Watson said, trying to sound threatening, even though he probably only sounded flustered.
“Darling,” Holmes drawled in that languid sort of way that made it seem like he might have, in another life, actually given a damn, were he not such an eminent deity, “I am smart with everyone.”
Of course he was just trying to be annoying, Watson knew this, for destruction helped Holmes pass the time between mentally stimulating cases, as did conducting experiments on Gladsone. However, knowledge was not quite power in this situation, as Watson just got a little bit more flustered.
“Damn it, Holmes!” He found it slightly disappointing that Holmes did not so much as flinch at his exclamation. “You think you can just whistle whenever you need me, and I’ll come running to your side?”
Holmes blinked, allowing adequate time for Watson’s words to sink in. “Don’t you?”
Flustered just gave way to furious, and Watson closed the distance between him and Holmes, trying to use his considerable height over the seated detective to his advantage. “Have you any idea how harrowing of a person you are to deal with?”
“I was merely under the impression that you run to my side whenever I call. Is that truly harrowing, then, simply running to one’s side?”
“You,” Watson all but snarled, the word full of venomous accusation for a whole litany of the threats that Holmes’ carelessness posed to his fragile psyche.
Holmes quickly cut him off. “Yes. Me.” He did not so much as sit up straighter in his chair under Watsons current imposition, and that angered Watson almost as much as the whistling had.
He decided that the best solution was to remove himself until he regained control of his senses, which he had clearly lost in choosing to pick a fight with Holmes. “I can hardly believe it,” he said, deciding to make an exit that he hoped would stir a bit of guilt in his companion. “That a mind so great as yours can’t even notice-”
“Your attraction to me?”
That stopped him in his tracks; his mind, his heart, and his improvised exit plan. Everything froze. After what felt like a lifetime but in actually was only a few brief, agonizing seconds, Watson decided that the best solution then was, rather than admitting that Holmes had him pegged, to feign confusion and hope for Holmes to feel guilty for overstepping the boundaries of friendship. “I... I beg your pardon, what?” he managed to stammer, his entire mouth dry as every inch of him begged for flight.
Holmes, however, plowed on forward, with all the grace of a bowling ball dropped from a great height. “I realized it only a moment ago. Your display just now has given you away, I’m afraid. As wont as I am to admit it,” he continued, despite the rather sorry display Watson was making as he attempted to draw enough air into his lungs so as to remain living, “my thoughts were elsewhere, thus distracting me from uncovering the truth sooner.”
“What’s it, then?” Watson choked, still thinking he had a chance if he acted out confusion well enough. “Your cocaine? Your... your,” his eyes darted around the room, helpless, looking for anything, anything he could say, anything blunt enough to bash in Holmes’ head with...
“My experimenting on Gladstone?” Holmes supplied for him, finding what Watson had been looking for, all smug and grinning triumphantly at being misconceived. He loved it when people got the wrong idea about him, and was obsessed with proving himself to who he referred to ‘the ignorants and commoners of London.’ Watson had never expected to be one of them. “Although,” he added, “as I am sure you would have, as always, claimed sole ownership over the beast, I should like to add for good measure that Gladstone is not yours, he is ours.”
“There is a reason why I never listen to you when you start up about that,” Watson said.
The reason was lying motionless on the rug.
“Anyway, back to my point,” Holmes said, and Watsons heart literally sank, as if it had hoped for one terrible second that he had successfully distracted Holmes from making the very poor choice to pursue such an accusation, only to be disappointed, “I was distracted by an attraction of my own.”
“So, what is it?” Watson said, giving up, throwing his arms up in exasperation as he backed away towards the door, careful not to tread on his, their... the dog. “Your bare-knuckle boxing matches? Your mysteries?”
By then, he had already made it over the threshold, through the doorway and into the hallway, so that Holmes sprang out of his chair and exclaimed, rather urgently, just before the door could slam shut, “Why, Watson, it’s you!”
The slam of the door echoed in Watsons skull, pounding against the very core of him, in perfect time with his heart. He welcomed the sound, inviting it to come and overwhelm him, so that he could no longer think, and therefore his mind would be unable to process what Holmes had just said. And yet, much like everything about the damnable man, his confession was more powerful than any faculties Watson could employ against it. And so he was overwhelmed, not by his beating heart, but by the silence on the other side of the door.
“What is me?”
“You heard me,” he heard Holmes reply. “Is there another stunning doctor with whom I share my residence?”
“I don’t know. Is there?” Watson was grateful that he was alone behind the closed study door, for he knew the faint smile he could feel tugging at the corners of his lips would have done terrible things to Holmes and what Watson was assuming was his incredibly strong resolve, if what he had said was indeed true.
After an incredible long stretch of silence, Holmes spoke again, his voice so quiet that Watson could have just written it off as being too soft to hear, that is, if he hadn’t heard, and if the words hadn’t affected him so. “Come back inside,” he said.
“Holmes, it’s illegal,” he breathed, and would have been more than happy if his words had gone unheard. Of course they didn’t. Instead, they proved far too practical for Holmes’ liking from someone being on the receiving end of what was, despite how traumatized Watson presently was, some very good news, for his footsteps sounded until he opened the door and looked Watson directly in the eyes.
“I don’t see how that possesses even an ounce of relevance,” he said, punctuating every syllable deliberately. Then he stepped back, in what Watson originally thought was his attempt at taking in how traumatized he must have looked, though he later realized was simply another invitation to come back into the study. Holmes smiled, then, looking rather pleased. “However, I’m relieved with how much thought you seem to have already given this...”
“This what?” Watson prompted, when Holmes failed to complete his thought.
But Holmes never did complete his thought. With what Watson was scandalized to recognize as a very suggestive swagger, along with the very suggestive tightness of his trousers, Holmes backed further into the study. “Holmes,” he said, taking a stand and moving no further than the doorway, “this what? What is it that I’ve given thought to?”
But Holmes only shook his head, and then looped his thumbs around his bracers, also quite suggestively.
“Holmes, what are you doing?” Watson said.
The smile widened, showing teeth. “Here puppy, puppy,” he coaxed.
Watson did come into the study, then, closing and locking the door behind him, but lingered, suddenly regretful. After all, Holmes did nothing without considering all results. What did he possibly expect Watson could do for him? “I’m no pup,” he said.
“Yes,” Holmes said, inclining his head towards his reluctant companion, “but I figure it’s the only way around that tragic saying, the one about old dogs and new tricks. If you catch my meaning.”
“I didn’t say I was old,” Watson said, physically balking at this speech. But Holmes’ smile never faltered, and in that moment, it seemed as if it never would.
“So,” Holmes said, slipping off his bracers deftly and closing the distance between him and Watson, “exactly what is it that you’re saying?”
He was so close that his breath warmed Watsons neck right through the collar of his shirt. If Holmes had a particular result in mind, then he clearly had to have taken every factor into consideration: Mrs Hudson downstairs, the snoring Gladstone on the floor, even the conditions under which Watson had come to live with him in the first place, the physical and mental fragility that drained Watson of every familiar part of himself until he was nothing more than a grey, limping skeleton with debts and bad dreams and no chance of ever being useful again.
But the way Holmes waited for him, the way Holmes had always waited for him, that is, if he wasn’t begging him to come along, made him feel like more; it also made him worry, just a little, for that physical fragility of his. So he dropped his head and made the only allusion to his weakness that he ever would, whispered into Holmes’ ear:
“Be gentle with me.”
And Holmes was. Or at least he tried to be. He started off gently enough, though his hesitancy soon melted away with how willingly Watsons mouth closed over his own, or how willingly Watsons teeth caught his lower lip and sucked, pulling them closer together with a hunger that inspired Holmes to try and find out if Watson still remembered his warning.
As it were, Watson didn’t remember for very long.
In fact, it could easily be said that their exertions’ transition from gentle to rather rough was actually instigated by Watson himself. Clothing was torn off with abandon, and Watson wrapped his arms around Holmes’ middle with organ-crushing force, sucking the very breath out of his lips.
Holmes looped his arms around Watsons neck, lest they be crushed between the two of them, and Watson re-adjusted his grip, taking hold of either side of Holmes’ bare waist in his hands. Holmes’ chest hitched with either sensitivity or anticipation.
“Watson, no,” he actually protested, squirming even as Watson guided him into a wall. “This is supposed to be...”
“John,” Watson said, dragging his teeth all down his front as he eased himself down onto his knees.
Still squirming, Holmes did allow himself to lean against the wall. His toes uncurled from the rug, and his hands began to roam through Watsons hair.
Watson decided that the squirming would be something to get used to, and took Holmes into his mouth, lest he squirm away from him.
“John,” Holmes gasped abruptly, most likely shocked with how gently Watson was not actually being. It seemed rather unfair, he thought, that Watson could shove him up against walls and use his teeth and, oh god, use his teeth, while he... while he himself simply melted into the wallpaper, sighing as he traced lazy circles across Watsons scalp.
And yet, the thought of gentleness would not quit from his mind. As Watson brought him closer and closer to the edge, Holmes removed his hands from Watson and twisted his fingers into his own hair instead. Hair pulling would not be considered gentle, after all, not in any sense of the word, and Holmes could not imagine causing Watson any discomfort in that moment.
Then, in the next moment, Holmes could not imagine anything at all, sinking all the way down the wall so that he could come face to face with that stunning doctor with whom he shared his residence, and then mouth to mouth, their kisses warm and sticky, and even warmer still when Watsons breath caressed him as he spoke.
“Now,” he said decisively, delightfully out of breath, “now you can...”
There was no need to say anything else. There was no need to really do anything else either, other than the minimal preparations (which, for some reason, Holmes kept handy in his desk drawer) for the task at hand. With one hand wrapped protectively around Watsons chest, Holmes did practice a bit of caution then in the way that he eased himself into his companion, slowly and almost cautiously and altogether very gently.
Watson was relatively silent throughout, save for his labored breathing, and then, when he and Holmes were truly together, a name:
“Sherlock,” he gasped, only to find, unhappily and quite alarmingly, that his companion had fallen victim to hysterics. Though Holmes did not relinquish the hold he had on, or in, Watson, he howled with a laughter that made Watsons cheeks burn with self conscious embarrassment. “I say,” he panted, somehow managing some control over his voice, “what is so funny?”
“You sound ridiculous,” Holmes said, still giggling helplessly as he tried to regain his composure, hiding his face as Watson craned his head back to look at him, “when you say my name like that.”
Watson had never heard a more ridiculous thing to say. “Are you actually serious? Now?” He contemplated crawling away from Holmes and what it would do to him, what it would do to the newly discovered them, in the present situation. “Alright, then, like what?”
Holmes took a deep, steadying breath. “Please, I implore you, I entreat you, call me anything but,” and then let out another burst of laughter, “Sherlock. I fear you’ve completely ruined everything. ”
“Who’s ruining things, now?” Watson narrowed his eyes into a glare, a glare of utmost frustration, total disapproval. And it was very, very hard to actively express any sort of controlled emotion with Holmes still inside of him. Watson didn’t quite know how he managed it.
“A million apologies,” Holmes said, his breath dancing over the taut muscles of Watsons backside, though he made no other move. “Please, call me anything.”
“Well I wasn’t trying to call you anything, was I,” Watson snapped, physically aching now as his frustration grew in tandem with another part of him. His neck also was getting sore from all the craning he was doing, and he turned back to face front. “It just slipped out.”
“Then call me anything,” Holmes said. “Anything you like. Even if it is that ridiculous name, I shall, somehow, endure it. For you.”
“Then I shall call you ridiculous,” he said, because there was only so long a man could wait with another man still inside of him.
“Good,” he said.
“Inconvenient,” Watson barked.
“Well,” he said, and brought his hand up from Watson’s chest to take hold of his chin and turn the man’s head back around so that they could see each other.
“I shall call you insane,” Watson breathed, all the while being watched by those dark, thoughtful eyes.
Clearly, referring to Holmes in a way that discredited his mental capacities had a much more positive impact on him than calling him by his own name. His response to what would, to anyone else, and probably from anyone else, be an insult was so surprisingly wonderful that Watson forgot instantly that he had just a moment ago been mad, frustrated, and so desperately tired of him. He arched to receive the lunatic in every way, letting himself be penetrated, and held, and kissed, pressing himself back against him, all the while making sure that he did not lose complete control and risk another slip like before. He wasn’t sure how well he could handle such an aching loss a second time.
He managed it beautifully, and when they collapsed together on the rug, with Watson sprawled out on his back and Holmes curled up at his side, with his head pillowed on his chest, the memory of any discrepancies were lost to the pleasures of simply lying and breathing and holding each other.
“Mmmm,” Holmes sighed, his face smiling against Watsons chest. “Whatever will I do without you?”
Watson cracked open his eyes and glanced down at Holmes, who was so close that all he could properly see of him was his eyes, and nose, and that satisfied, grinning mouth of his. “I shan’t be going anywhere just yet. Don’t trouble yourself.”
“But one day, you will. I am most sure of it.”
Though he was more tired than he ever thought he could be, in the best of ways to be tired, and though his limbs felt heavier than he had strength to carry, Watson managed to bring a hand up to brush the hair from Holmes’ forehead. “What makes you say that?”
“Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore...” Holmes muttered, mostly to himself, for his eyes were closed. But then he seemed to catch himself showing possibly a little too much of his vulnerability, and he recovered brilliantly, “etc. etc., you must know the sonnet.”
“So do our minutes hasten to our end,” Watson said, proving that he did, indeed, know it. “Recite it for me.”
“Not now,” said Holmes, trying to cover up what he most likely considered to be a blunder. “Let’s just lie here.”
Watson reached up to run a hand through the mess of hair on the head which was presently treating his chest like a pillow. “Need I remind you that you were the one who brought it up?”
“Regretfully,” Holmes admitted. “However, it was a mistake on my part, a terrible mistake, to shatter such a wonderful silence.” And yet, he continued speaking, as if unaware of the words pouring out of his mouth. “It is inevitable, much like everything else, that time will eventually take you from me. And so I asked you, in all seriousness, what I shall do without you. For I dare say the void your absence will leave in me will be far, far greater than can be filled by that dog of yours lying not two meters away.”
For some time after his friend’s remarkable confession, Watson couldn’t speak. He was both deeply moved by the kind words that had just been said about him, and so completely surprised by the break in his companion’s typical character, for confessions of the heart were not part of his usual repertoire, that he couldn’t properly form any words. His shock eventually won out over his own heart, swelling with joy, that the response he ended up using was far less meaningful than he had wished.
So, in return for such honesty, Watson rewarded Holmes with silence, doing nothing more than stroking his hair. Other than that, there they lay, entwined on the rug, until Gladstone, not two meters away, woke with a snort, waddled over and began to lick Watsons face.
--
The sonnet they are referring to is Shakespeare's Sonnet #60, a beautiful and ominous thing.
fandom: Sherlock Holmes Movieverse (could be book as well)
Pairing: Holmes/Watson Slash
rating: R (sexual content)
words: 3,788
summary:Watson feels unappreciated, so, naturally, Holmes disproves this in the most inconvenient way possible.
author's note: Thanks to paperclipbitch, taconaco and avalonauggie where thanks is due, as it so rightly is.
One day, John Watson entertained the thought that he was not actually of any importance to his companion Sherlock Holmes.
The events leading up to Watson coming to this conclusion are as follows: Holmes, in an effort to get Watsons attention, pursed his lips together and blew through them, producing a whistling sound. Only as Watson started to make his exit of the room, in his own effort to make it known to Holmes how much he disapproved of such a tactic, did he notice the body of Gladstone, his dear little dog, lying prone on the carpet.
“Not to worry,” Holmes called to him. “He isn’t dead! Just... resting.”
Watson didn’t respond right away. The last pieces of the puzzle he didn’t even know, until that very instant, he had been trying to solve had finally clicked into place, and he was just then coming to the seemingly monumental conclusion that, in his companions most revered esteems, he was of no more use than Gladstone, and all he was good for was eating dropped food and then filling a room with noxious fumes.
Yes, Holmes took Watson with him on every one of his cases, and on some of these he was able to put his rather exceptional combat skills to actual detective-saving use; such occasions led Watson to believe that he was, in fact, quite relevant to Holmes’ detecting needs. Rarely did he miss a target, and his skills with a firearm proved very useful to his companion. But surely if he was not on hand with his revolver, Holmes wouldn’t be able to pursue his cases in ways that would require the use of guns at all. As it were, since shootouts seemed to occur with disturbing regularity, Watson doubted Holmes’ skills at solving cases any other way.
However, Watson was not particularly gifted in the crime solving department. He had no head for deductions, try as Holmes might to nurture his attentiveness to the relevance of the most minute details which Watson could never seem to wrap his mind around. He also was well versed in Holmes’ distaste for the unintelligent, and if he could not keep up with Holmes’ brilliant mind, what, according to that brilliant mind, was he good for?
Thus came the dilemma, for even though Watson rarely caught onto Holmes’ leads without the detective having to literally spell the mysteries out for him, Holmes often shared his findings with him. This led Watson to believe that Holmes might not know the answers himself, which was a rare occurrence indeed. But, alas, when all was said and done, these queries proved to be merely a source of amusement for Holmes, as if to assure himself that, yes, he truly was a genius, to whose intellect no others’ could compare.
And yet, despite all this, Holmes still insisted that Watson always be with him, and would go to extraordinarily immature lengths to get him to concede. This made it difficult for Watson to come to his particular conclusion, for he considered just letting go and forgetting he wanted to say anything at all in remembering how Holmes would deliberately forget his revolver, or feign concern about his particular ventures, things that never failed to get Watson to drop whatever he was doing and dive headfirst into the inevitable danger.
But then Holmes whistled at him. As if he were a dog, as if he were Gladstone, and Watson found himself no longer able to control himself.
“So that’s it, then,” he snapped, as he whipped around to meet the cause of his tremendous frustration face to face. “I’m just your dog?”
“Excellent deduction, friend, although I must tell you that it is rather an inaccurate one,” Holmes said, and damn it all, he was smirking. “I do love it when you guess, though. Hypotheses so often lead to verity, as you well know.”
“Don’t be smart with me,” Watson said, trying to sound threatening, even though he probably only sounded flustered.
“Darling,” Holmes drawled in that languid sort of way that made it seem like he might have, in another life, actually given a damn, were he not such an eminent deity, “I am smart with everyone.”
Of course he was just trying to be annoying, Watson knew this, for destruction helped Holmes pass the time between mentally stimulating cases, as did conducting experiments on Gladsone. However, knowledge was not quite power in this situation, as Watson just got a little bit more flustered.
“Damn it, Holmes!” He found it slightly disappointing that Holmes did not so much as flinch at his exclamation. “You think you can just whistle whenever you need me, and I’ll come running to your side?”
Holmes blinked, allowing adequate time for Watson’s words to sink in. “Don’t you?”
Flustered just gave way to furious, and Watson closed the distance between him and Holmes, trying to use his considerable height over the seated detective to his advantage. “Have you any idea how harrowing of a person you are to deal with?”
“I was merely under the impression that you run to my side whenever I call. Is that truly harrowing, then, simply running to one’s side?”
“You,” Watson all but snarled, the word full of venomous accusation for a whole litany of the threats that Holmes’ carelessness posed to his fragile psyche.
Holmes quickly cut him off. “Yes. Me.” He did not so much as sit up straighter in his chair under Watsons current imposition, and that angered Watson almost as much as the whistling had.
He decided that the best solution was to remove himself until he regained control of his senses, which he had clearly lost in choosing to pick a fight with Holmes. “I can hardly believe it,” he said, deciding to make an exit that he hoped would stir a bit of guilt in his companion. “That a mind so great as yours can’t even notice-”
“Your attraction to me?”
That stopped him in his tracks; his mind, his heart, and his improvised exit plan. Everything froze. After what felt like a lifetime but in actually was only a few brief, agonizing seconds, Watson decided that the best solution then was, rather than admitting that Holmes had him pegged, to feign confusion and hope for Holmes to feel guilty for overstepping the boundaries of friendship. “I... I beg your pardon, what?” he managed to stammer, his entire mouth dry as every inch of him begged for flight.
Holmes, however, plowed on forward, with all the grace of a bowling ball dropped from a great height. “I realized it only a moment ago. Your display just now has given you away, I’m afraid. As wont as I am to admit it,” he continued, despite the rather sorry display Watson was making as he attempted to draw enough air into his lungs so as to remain living, “my thoughts were elsewhere, thus distracting me from uncovering the truth sooner.”
“What’s it, then?” Watson choked, still thinking he had a chance if he acted out confusion well enough. “Your cocaine? Your... your,” his eyes darted around the room, helpless, looking for anything, anything he could say, anything blunt enough to bash in Holmes’ head with...
“My experimenting on Gladstone?” Holmes supplied for him, finding what Watson had been looking for, all smug and grinning triumphantly at being misconceived. He loved it when people got the wrong idea about him, and was obsessed with proving himself to who he referred to ‘the ignorants and commoners of London.’ Watson had never expected to be one of them. “Although,” he added, “as I am sure you would have, as always, claimed sole ownership over the beast, I should like to add for good measure that Gladstone is not yours, he is ours.”
“There is a reason why I never listen to you when you start up about that,” Watson said.
The reason was lying motionless on the rug.
“Anyway, back to my point,” Holmes said, and Watsons heart literally sank, as if it had hoped for one terrible second that he had successfully distracted Holmes from making the very poor choice to pursue such an accusation, only to be disappointed, “I was distracted by an attraction of my own.”
“So, what is it?” Watson said, giving up, throwing his arms up in exasperation as he backed away towards the door, careful not to tread on his, their... the dog. “Your bare-knuckle boxing matches? Your mysteries?”
By then, he had already made it over the threshold, through the doorway and into the hallway, so that Holmes sprang out of his chair and exclaimed, rather urgently, just before the door could slam shut, “Why, Watson, it’s you!”
The slam of the door echoed in Watsons skull, pounding against the very core of him, in perfect time with his heart. He welcomed the sound, inviting it to come and overwhelm him, so that he could no longer think, and therefore his mind would be unable to process what Holmes had just said. And yet, much like everything about the damnable man, his confession was more powerful than any faculties Watson could employ against it. And so he was overwhelmed, not by his beating heart, but by the silence on the other side of the door.
“What is me?”
“You heard me,” he heard Holmes reply. “Is there another stunning doctor with whom I share my residence?”
“I don’t know. Is there?” Watson was grateful that he was alone behind the closed study door, for he knew the faint smile he could feel tugging at the corners of his lips would have done terrible things to Holmes and what Watson was assuming was his incredibly strong resolve, if what he had said was indeed true.
After an incredible long stretch of silence, Holmes spoke again, his voice so quiet that Watson could have just written it off as being too soft to hear, that is, if he hadn’t heard, and if the words hadn’t affected him so. “Come back inside,” he said.
“Holmes, it’s illegal,” he breathed, and would have been more than happy if his words had gone unheard. Of course they didn’t. Instead, they proved far too practical for Holmes’ liking from someone being on the receiving end of what was, despite how traumatized Watson presently was, some very good news, for his footsteps sounded until he opened the door and looked Watson directly in the eyes.
“I don’t see how that possesses even an ounce of relevance,” he said, punctuating every syllable deliberately. Then he stepped back, in what Watson originally thought was his attempt at taking in how traumatized he must have looked, though he later realized was simply another invitation to come back into the study. Holmes smiled, then, looking rather pleased. “However, I’m relieved with how much thought you seem to have already given this...”
“This what?” Watson prompted, when Holmes failed to complete his thought.
But Holmes never did complete his thought. With what Watson was scandalized to recognize as a very suggestive swagger, along with the very suggestive tightness of his trousers, Holmes backed further into the study. “Holmes,” he said, taking a stand and moving no further than the doorway, “this what? What is it that I’ve given thought to?”
But Holmes only shook his head, and then looped his thumbs around his bracers, also quite suggestively.
“Holmes, what are you doing?” Watson said.
The smile widened, showing teeth. “Here puppy, puppy,” he coaxed.
Watson did come into the study, then, closing and locking the door behind him, but lingered, suddenly regretful. After all, Holmes did nothing without considering all results. What did he possibly expect Watson could do for him? “I’m no pup,” he said.
“Yes,” Holmes said, inclining his head towards his reluctant companion, “but I figure it’s the only way around that tragic saying, the one about old dogs and new tricks. If you catch my meaning.”
“I didn’t say I was old,” Watson said, physically balking at this speech. But Holmes’ smile never faltered, and in that moment, it seemed as if it never would.
“So,” Holmes said, slipping off his bracers deftly and closing the distance between him and Watson, “exactly what is it that you’re saying?”
He was so close that his breath warmed Watsons neck right through the collar of his shirt. If Holmes had a particular result in mind, then he clearly had to have taken every factor into consideration: Mrs Hudson downstairs, the snoring Gladstone on the floor, even the conditions under which Watson had come to live with him in the first place, the physical and mental fragility that drained Watson of every familiar part of himself until he was nothing more than a grey, limping skeleton with debts and bad dreams and no chance of ever being useful again.
But the way Holmes waited for him, the way Holmes had always waited for him, that is, if he wasn’t begging him to come along, made him feel like more; it also made him worry, just a little, for that physical fragility of his. So he dropped his head and made the only allusion to his weakness that he ever would, whispered into Holmes’ ear:
“Be gentle with me.”
And Holmes was. Or at least he tried to be. He started off gently enough, though his hesitancy soon melted away with how willingly Watsons mouth closed over his own, or how willingly Watsons teeth caught his lower lip and sucked, pulling them closer together with a hunger that inspired Holmes to try and find out if Watson still remembered his warning.
As it were, Watson didn’t remember for very long.
In fact, it could easily be said that their exertions’ transition from gentle to rather rough was actually instigated by Watson himself. Clothing was torn off with abandon, and Watson wrapped his arms around Holmes’ middle with organ-crushing force, sucking the very breath out of his lips.
Holmes looped his arms around Watsons neck, lest they be crushed between the two of them, and Watson re-adjusted his grip, taking hold of either side of Holmes’ bare waist in his hands. Holmes’ chest hitched with either sensitivity or anticipation.
“Watson, no,” he actually protested, squirming even as Watson guided him into a wall. “This is supposed to be...”
“John,” Watson said, dragging his teeth all down his front as he eased himself down onto his knees.
Still squirming, Holmes did allow himself to lean against the wall. His toes uncurled from the rug, and his hands began to roam through Watsons hair.
Watson decided that the squirming would be something to get used to, and took Holmes into his mouth, lest he squirm away from him.
“John,” Holmes gasped abruptly, most likely shocked with how gently Watson was not actually being. It seemed rather unfair, he thought, that Watson could shove him up against walls and use his teeth and, oh god, use his teeth, while he... while he himself simply melted into the wallpaper, sighing as he traced lazy circles across Watsons scalp.
And yet, the thought of gentleness would not quit from his mind. As Watson brought him closer and closer to the edge, Holmes removed his hands from Watson and twisted his fingers into his own hair instead. Hair pulling would not be considered gentle, after all, not in any sense of the word, and Holmes could not imagine causing Watson any discomfort in that moment.
Then, in the next moment, Holmes could not imagine anything at all, sinking all the way down the wall so that he could come face to face with that stunning doctor with whom he shared his residence, and then mouth to mouth, their kisses warm and sticky, and even warmer still when Watsons breath caressed him as he spoke.
“Now,” he said decisively, delightfully out of breath, “now you can...”
There was no need to say anything else. There was no need to really do anything else either, other than the minimal preparations (which, for some reason, Holmes kept handy in his desk drawer) for the task at hand. With one hand wrapped protectively around Watsons chest, Holmes did practice a bit of caution then in the way that he eased himself into his companion, slowly and almost cautiously and altogether very gently.
Watson was relatively silent throughout, save for his labored breathing, and then, when he and Holmes were truly together, a name:
“Sherlock,” he gasped, only to find, unhappily and quite alarmingly, that his companion had fallen victim to hysterics. Though Holmes did not relinquish the hold he had on, or in, Watson, he howled with a laughter that made Watsons cheeks burn with self conscious embarrassment. “I say,” he panted, somehow managing some control over his voice, “what is so funny?”
“You sound ridiculous,” Holmes said, still giggling helplessly as he tried to regain his composure, hiding his face as Watson craned his head back to look at him, “when you say my name like that.”
Watson had never heard a more ridiculous thing to say. “Are you actually serious? Now?” He contemplated crawling away from Holmes and what it would do to him, what it would do to the newly discovered them, in the present situation. “Alright, then, like what?”
Holmes took a deep, steadying breath. “Please, I implore you, I entreat you, call me anything but,” and then let out another burst of laughter, “Sherlock. I fear you’ve completely ruined everything. ”
“Who’s ruining things, now?” Watson narrowed his eyes into a glare, a glare of utmost frustration, total disapproval. And it was very, very hard to actively express any sort of controlled emotion with Holmes still inside of him. Watson didn’t quite know how he managed it.
“A million apologies,” Holmes said, his breath dancing over the taut muscles of Watsons backside, though he made no other move. “Please, call me anything.”
“Well I wasn’t trying to call you anything, was I,” Watson snapped, physically aching now as his frustration grew in tandem with another part of him. His neck also was getting sore from all the craning he was doing, and he turned back to face front. “It just slipped out.”
“Then call me anything,” Holmes said. “Anything you like. Even if it is that ridiculous name, I shall, somehow, endure it. For you.”
“Then I shall call you ridiculous,” he said, because there was only so long a man could wait with another man still inside of him.
“Good,” he said.
“Inconvenient,” Watson barked.
“Well,” he said, and brought his hand up from Watson’s chest to take hold of his chin and turn the man’s head back around so that they could see each other.
“I shall call you insane,” Watson breathed, all the while being watched by those dark, thoughtful eyes.
Clearly, referring to Holmes in a way that discredited his mental capacities had a much more positive impact on him than calling him by his own name. His response to what would, to anyone else, and probably from anyone else, be an insult was so surprisingly wonderful that Watson forgot instantly that he had just a moment ago been mad, frustrated, and so desperately tired of him. He arched to receive the lunatic in every way, letting himself be penetrated, and held, and kissed, pressing himself back against him, all the while making sure that he did not lose complete control and risk another slip like before. He wasn’t sure how well he could handle such an aching loss a second time.
He managed it beautifully, and when they collapsed together on the rug, with Watson sprawled out on his back and Holmes curled up at his side, with his head pillowed on his chest, the memory of any discrepancies were lost to the pleasures of simply lying and breathing and holding each other.
“Mmmm,” Holmes sighed, his face smiling against Watsons chest. “Whatever will I do without you?”
Watson cracked open his eyes and glanced down at Holmes, who was so close that all he could properly see of him was his eyes, and nose, and that satisfied, grinning mouth of his. “I shan’t be going anywhere just yet. Don’t trouble yourself.”
“But one day, you will. I am most sure of it.”
Though he was more tired than he ever thought he could be, in the best of ways to be tired, and though his limbs felt heavier than he had strength to carry, Watson managed to bring a hand up to brush the hair from Holmes’ forehead. “What makes you say that?”
“Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore...” Holmes muttered, mostly to himself, for his eyes were closed. But then he seemed to catch himself showing possibly a little too much of his vulnerability, and he recovered brilliantly, “etc. etc., you must know the sonnet.”
“So do our minutes hasten to our end,” Watson said, proving that he did, indeed, know it. “Recite it for me.”
“Not now,” said Holmes, trying to cover up what he most likely considered to be a blunder. “Let’s just lie here.”
Watson reached up to run a hand through the mess of hair on the head which was presently treating his chest like a pillow. “Need I remind you that you were the one who brought it up?”
“Regretfully,” Holmes admitted. “However, it was a mistake on my part, a terrible mistake, to shatter such a wonderful silence.” And yet, he continued speaking, as if unaware of the words pouring out of his mouth. “It is inevitable, much like everything else, that time will eventually take you from me. And so I asked you, in all seriousness, what I shall do without you. For I dare say the void your absence will leave in me will be far, far greater than can be filled by that dog of yours lying not two meters away.”
For some time after his friend’s remarkable confession, Watson couldn’t speak. He was both deeply moved by the kind words that had just been said about him, and so completely surprised by the break in his companion’s typical character, for confessions of the heart were not part of his usual repertoire, that he couldn’t properly form any words. His shock eventually won out over his own heart, swelling with joy, that the response he ended up using was far less meaningful than he had wished.
So, in return for such honesty, Watson rewarded Holmes with silence, doing nothing more than stroking his hair. Other than that, there they lay, entwined on the rug, until Gladstone, not two meters away, woke with a snort, waddled over and began to lick Watsons face.
--
The sonnet they are referring to is Shakespeare's Sonnet #60, a beautiful and ominous thing.