thewhitelily

“So, Mary Morstan…” prompted John. Apparently he thought Sherlock might need a reminder of his fiancee’s name—as though Sherlock would have forgotten that when it finally seemed John had finally—most likely by accident, given his previous abysmal discrimination on such matters—happened upon a woman who didn’t bore him to tears.

“Yes,” agreed Sherlock again. The problem was that John didn’t have any other friends. At least he hadn’t. Oh, Lestrade would have kept in touch while Sherlock was away, and Mike had always been so keen to recapture his glory days that was instantly on board with any overture no matter how long John went without contacting him.

John hadn’t had any other friends.  But Sherlock had been gone, and John’s life had moved on.

“And…” John prompted, then looked away, apparently frustrated with Sherlock’s ignorance of his current life, as though they weren’t both perfectly aware at this point that the image in Sherlock’s head during his absence of John patiently awaiting his return had been hopelessly naive. All John’s other friends who Sherlock had known hated John, deep down. Fools. Of course, except for—

“You.”

Sherlock’s focussed, coherent thoughts shattered.

He was John’s—

Perhaps he should look up Sebastian to see if he had any little problems he—

John, while I’m flattered—

John had been on to him to get some cards printed—

—this is a surprise, a somewhat… daunting request. I never expected—

—business cards, with the email and the blog address, which they could give to—

Not his blog, why did no one ever realise that Sherlock’s blog was the one with the more useful—

—I’ve never been anyone’s—

—because one of the first things Sherlock had learned about interpersonal relationships was—

Don’t be childish, Sherlock. It doesn't matter if the other children don’t like you.

—best—

—information on it, not like John’s romanticised accounts that—

—needed solved: ‘colleagues’ indeed. That would show the smarmy little—

—that ‘humanised him’ as though he needed humanising, wasn’t he obviously a—

Freak, he’ll always be a freak, I don’t know how you can trust him!

—friend before, and I’m not certain—

For god’s sake he wasn’t prepared for this, Sherlock wasn’t—

Don’t make people into heroes, John.

—that I can. But of course I’ll do my best to carry out the—

What was it that he wanted Sherlock to—

—the rareness of true reciprocity; John, of course—

Put the wind up everybody. We hated him.

—bastard, he didn’t matter, of course he didn’t matter, only John mattered—

—best anything before. Was there a—

—task of being your best—

—clients with “Sherlock Holmes: Consulting Detective and Best—

—being his only friend, was obviously Sherlock’s—

—friend, which as recent events have shown is one that I find personally—

—cut out to be a friend at all, because he hadn’t even realised the last time John had—

Do you have any idea what you’ve done to him?

—challenging. I find it gratifying that you would trust me with—

—trusted him, Sherlock had hurt him so badly he’d grown a—

Now, you let me grieve, hmm? How could you do that.

—the responsibility of—

—Friend”, because he was John’s—

—best—

—after—

—ceremony to confirm it? Or a test? Surely there was something a—

—human? John obviously thought so, if Sherlock was his—

—best—

Was John really so desperate that Sherlock was his only—

—best—

—no, not his only, John wasn’t Sherlock, he had many friends, Sherlock was his—

—best—

—best…

Sherlock took a breath, finally marshalling his thoughts onto a single track, and frowned at John. He wanted to be very clear about this.

Because this was… quite extraordinary.

“So, in fact,” he said carefully, “you-you mean…”

John’s expression had changed, developed that tolerant amusement that it got when, in his opinion, Sherlock was being unbearably slow about something.

“Yes,” prompted John.

But John was his, after all, Sherlock had just never suspected he might be John’s…

“I’m your…”

John pulled back, waiting.

“… best…” Sherlock tried out the shape of the word on his tongue, the way it wanted to flow on to the next word.

“… man,” said John, running out of patience.

“… friend?” came out of Sherlock’s mouth, just a little too late to stop it.

John’s face mouth had dropped open a little, shocked and perhaps hurt.

Sherlock frowned: apparently he’d got it wrong. Although really, what else did John expect with making Sherlock play guessing games to rub it in about all the things he didn’t know anymore about—

“Yeah, ’course you are,” he said, before Sherlock’s brain could take another detour into incoherence. “’Course.”

He stared at Sherlock, as though it was an obvious fact that he’d somehow neglected to mention at any point during the last four years; as though the last two years and all that had happened in them had had no impact on that obvious fact at all.

“You’re my best friend,” said John simply.

Best friend, sang Sherlock’s thoughts in unison. He was John’s best friend. Even with... everything.

Blindly, he groped for his tea, and discovered that even a stewed, seared eyeball couldn’t spoil it.