Observers- BBC Sherlock x Reader Chpt. 54

“Oh no you don’t.” John gently scolded when you all arrived back at the flat and you tried to unlock your door- your hands shaking as they fumbled with the keys. You brother pulled them out of your hands and used his other hand to carefully encourage you towards the stairs, “I know you, Squeak. If I allow you to stay down here it will end in one of two ways and neither of them is good.”

You opened your mouth to protest but he cut you off, reading your mind, “You can borrow some night clothes from me and whatever jumper you’d like. Up you go.”

There was no point in arguing, he was in full big brother protective mode, so you just shuffled up the stairs, following Sherlock as John made sure you didn’t try to go back down. You collapsed into John’s chair, throwing your legs over one of the arms, and Sherlock, having noted that your shoes were rubbing painfully a long while ago, reached to pull them off. He found your feet quickly out of his grasp as you shot him a glare and growled, “I can do it myself.”

He looked adorably confused for a moment but you just scowled and leaned over to unstrap the red heels from your aching feet. It took him a few blinks to realize you were still upset which confused him even more and he defeatedly flopped down on the couch just as John emerged from his room with a bundle of clothes. You took it from him without a word and padded away to change, bathroom door shutting with a little more force than necessary behind you. John looked worriedly after you before turning back to Sherlock to demand, “Alright. Enough of this. You need to tell me what happened.”

There was a period of silence as John waited for some sort of answer with his arms crossed before Sherlock finally decided he didn’t really have very many other options, “I may have misspoken about something important.”

John sighed, “So nothing new then… Did you explain to her what you really meant?”

“I apologized.” Sherlock grumbled and John gaped at him for a second, “You apologized…?”

“Yes, John. That is what I just said, isn’t it? I know it’s difficult for you to process things but could you at least try to keep up?”

John rolled his eyes with a huff, reminding himself that he was doing this for you and not the difficult twat in front of him, “Alright so the great Sherlock Holmes apologized… did you tell her why you were apologizing?”  

There was a pause before Sherlock begrudgingly admitted, “No.”

John rubbed at his brow in frustration, wondering how exactly he could explain to Sherlock why doing so was important before venturing an attempt, “You can’t just apologize and expect everything to go back to normal. She needs to know why you were apologizing… it’s like… you wouldn’t wrap up a case by just saying someone is a criminal without giving a full display of your deductions, would you?”

Something seemed to click and Sherlock sat up to lace his fingers underneath his chin, “So you’re saying it’s not enough to be sorry… I also have to explain why? Your sister is not an idiot, John. She is perfectly capable of figuring that out on her own.”

“How are you so… so… DENSE?” John seethed lowly, “If you don’t say what it is you are apologizing for you could be apologizing for anything and even if she did figure it out, there are some things that need to be said aloud to actually have an effect.”

Sherlock rolled to face the back of the couch, displeased with John’s advice, and went back to trying to come up with his own solution to this problem while John let out an exasperated sigh and went to make tea for when you came back.

In the bathroom, you slid off your dress, letting it fall to the floor, before taking a wet towel to your face and neck to get rid of the make up you’d used to cover your choke bruises. You traced the love bite Sherlock had left you with a finger before tying back your hair into a sloppy ponytail and splashing water over your face with a heavy sigh.

There was too much going on in your head for you to think clearly. You weren’t a genius like Sherlock who could compartmentalize everything and handle the multitude of things that were thrown at him in a blink- you were normal. That was all… just normal. You couldn’t handle so many things in the course of one day without feeling like you were drowning.

You almost wished that John didn’t know you so well and he’d just left you alone with your thoughts. Ultimately, he was right- if he had you would have either torn apart your apartment and then lain on the floor in the mess or started painting almost frantically in an attempt to deal with your thoughts and stayed that way for days. You tugged on the shirt and sweatpants John had given you and then the cream jumper he knew you loved, burying your face in the front of it to deeply breath in the familiar scent. What would you do without John?

Padding out to join them again, you sat down at the living room table, pulling your feet up to sit cross-legged as you flipped open your sketchbook. John pursed his lips when he saw you, thinking that you should rest, but he knew better than to disturb you when you were drawing and just set your cup of tea next to you. He stroked your hair lightly and then pressed a kiss to the top of your bent head, “Try not to stay up too much longer, Squeak. You’ve had a long day.”

You mumbled something that sounded like, “Night, Johnny,” as you grabbed an array of pencils to try and find the one you wanted and John slipped off to his room with a yawn. Sherlock shifted on the couch so he could watch you work, noting that this was a different level of sketching than what he’d seen from you before with you hastily switching pencils as you moved across the paper, and then closed his eyes to block out the rising sun and think.

After a few hours and numerous, highly detailed drawings, Sherlock was brought out of his thoughts by the sound of your pencil point snapping from the intense pressure you were putting on the paper. You huffed, using the interruption of your work to flex your hand with a slight grimace before trying to find your pencil sharpener with the other. He narrowed his eyes when you started up again but with your non-dominant hand, cradling the one you’d been using in your lap. He got up and grabbed it before you could do anything to stop him.

You blinked at him angrily through the haze of your thoughts as he slipped into the chair next to you, taking your hand in both of his in a way that demanded your attention. He pressed the pads of his thumbs firmly into your palm and you gave a pained gasp, trying to pull away from him as he started to rub circles across the appendage’s sore muscles. You relaxed after a moment when he got past the immediate stiffness and he lifted his eyes to look at you, “He left more scars on you than I originally thought.”

You shifted uncomfortably, letting him keep your hand as you turned back to continue with your work, “It’s not a scar, Sherlock. It just gets stiff sometimes.”

He moved to your fingers, gently tracing one before pressing his thumb against it just above the bottom joint. You squeaked, attempting to pull away again, but he kept a firm grip on your hand. Loosening it when you gave up, he traced each of your fingers as he quietly hummed, “Multiple fractures in every finger… the internal scaring is obviously extensive. It’s no wonder it bothers you.”

You didn’t bother to ask how he’d known what your ex had done to your hand, setting down your pencil to look at him with sudden seriousness, “What do you want from me, Sherlock?”

He looked down at your hand in silence for a moment, sandwiching it between his before flatly stating, “Patience.”

Looking up to see you tilting your head at him in tired confusion, he continued, “I’m aware that at times I can be… insensitive… and I’ll admit that this is an experiment but not in the way you think. I’m curious about how I react to anything involving you… everything I do with you is an experiment because I’ve never attempted it before and as such can only hypothesize what the outcome may be. The only thing that I can say for certain is that it is not nor will it ever be my intent to hurt you.”

There was a tense moment as you blinked to try and process that and then you sighed, rubbing at your temple, “I’m more than willing to be patient, Sherly, but you did hurt me. I think maybe we should take a step back…”


He moved a hand to cup your cheek and you inadvertently leaned into his touch, causing him to smirk as you sleepily hummed, “That’s not playing fair, Sherlock.”

Pulling you up with very little resistance, he murmured, “All’s fair in love and war, darling,” before stretching out on the couch and tugging you to his chest. Too exhausted to try and fight it or to even verbally protest, you just snuggled into him and slipped off into a dreamless sleep.