Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

He was transfixed by the glow.

The windows of the whole street he was in right now, were lit up rose-golden—each lit square a painting of warmth. Oddly enough, it reminded him of Christmas when he had been just a boy—he and his sister storming out of the cold, snowy December day into their heated house, the fire already alight and flaming in the fireplace, and the whole house bathed in that same golden light. He remembered the smell of gingerbread his mother baked the entire day, scolding him with a small smile not to eat them before Christmas Eve. Or the nativity play they watched every year in the local church, where everyone knew everyone, and the pastor always ended the service with a gentle, aching violin melody.

Oh, the sounds of the violin… how it had sounded when he had played—

John shook himself out of the trance before his thoughts drifted into that dangerous direction. He couldn’t deal with this. Not in public.

The cane tapped rhythmically against the pavement as he walked, the only sound keeping him tethered to the night. His gaze swayed once more to the glowing windows. Through glass decorated with what looked like hand-cut paper stars, he caught movement. A woman entered, placing something down on a counter. Moments later another woman appeared, smiling and with a baby strapped to her chest. She hugged the first from behind, the infant reaching out joyfully for them both.

They looked so blissful, so happy, it made John‘s chest tightened.

He thought of his own flat—dark, one cup of forgotten tea on a dusty counter, cold and silent. Too silent.

He stood there for at least five minutes, silently praying they wouldn’t notice him and mistake him for some stalker. But he couldn’t help himself. Maybe, if he watched others live—laughing, loving—his mind would stop hurling him into its blackest depths whenever he closed his eyes. Maybe if he soaked up the remnants of warmth—even if only from light spilling out of windows—his heart would flicker back to life.

But then again, is that something I even want? Something I deserve?

His hands tugged the black wool collar higher against his throat. He breathed in and there it was again: the faint scent pressed deep into the fabric. Gunpowder. Cigarettes. And beneath that—sharper, stranger—Sherlock. A sterile tang of lab chemicals, ozone, smoke and cologne and something that had never been named but was uniquely, undeniably him.

John’s throat tightened. The coat was never meant to be his. It should have been locked away as evidence. But when the hospital staff had given him Sherlock’s belongings, he couldn’t let it go. He’d been told—ordered—to give everything to Scotland Yard. Yet when his hands touched the coat, something inside him whispered: Keep it. He’ll need it when he comes back.

The police had never asked again. Lestrade, John suspected, had quietly made sure of that. John was grateful. Pathetically, desperately grateful. Because wearing the coat made him feel closer to Sherlock than he probably ever would again.

Walking without thought, he realized he’d returned to his street. Three houses before 221B, there was a closed shop for kitchen supplies, always had been. But this time, as John looked into the darkened window, he caught his reflection. For a second, in the tall collar and shifting shadows, it wasn’t himself he saw but Sherlock staring back at him. His breath stuttered, throat tightening. Then the illusion fractured and he was only John again.

He then unlocked the door to his flat. Darkness greeted him, and the familiar stairs up to the flat he now lived in alone. Everything in him resisted going upstairs, having to spend yet another sleepless night without company. Without his notice, John’s feet had moved and he stood in front of Mrs. Hudson’s door with his hand hovering over the wood. She’d open, she’d look at him with those soft eyes, offer him tea, maybe a biscuit. She’d listen if he asked. But he recoiled before knocking.

She had suffered enough already, John reminded himself while stepping back, i won‘t pull her down with me.

So he limped upstairs, relishing the sting of pain in his leg with each step, a reminder he was still tethered here.

That was his life now: sitting in his armchair every night, staring at the one across from him. His world shrank to walks, therapy sessions that didn’t really help, rare visits from Stamford, and the occasional forced outing when Greg or Molly dragged him out.

One such a night, they had all but dragged him into a pub, and John—angry, unwilling, but too tired to fight—had gone with them. They drank. God, they drank a lot. He even found himself laughing once, though it hurt slightly. They stumbled into a cab and then home at dawn afterwards, Mrs. Hudson taking John‘s arm to steady him as he tried to not let the his keys fall to the floor while opening the door. While Mrs. Hudson just wished him a good night and went straight to bed, John stumbled up the stairs and even managed to collapse into his own bed.

And for once, he slept. Deep and dreamless.

Until—

Music.

A violin.

Sweet, achingly soft, curling through his sleeping mind until it awoke him. While the continuous violin play nearly had robbed him of his last nerve in the past, he would’ve given everything to hear it again. But he did hear the music right now, right? That meant—

“Sherlock!”

John scrambled upright and out of bed immediately, his legs tangling with the sheets and making him hit the floor with a thump in the process. He didn’t care.

His body lurched forward, half crawling, half staggering, until he burst into the living room.

And froze.

There he was.

Tall. Slim. The unmistakable silhouette. Standing at the window as though he had never left, violin cradled at his shoulder, bow gliding in smooth, practiced arcs. Back turned, posture loose, the very image of a man at ease in his own kingdom.

Sherlock bloody Holmes.

John’s throat cracked open. “Sh—Sherlock?” The name tore out of him, raw, half a sob, half a shout. Suddenly he staggered forward, limp forgotten in the violent lurch of his body. He almost collided with him, almost seized him by the arms, but seeing Sherlock‘s face after all those weeks, while the figure turned, froze him to his spot.

That face. Angular, pale, luminous in the moonlight filtering through the window. That faintly amused curve of the mouth, like John’s shock was nothing but another deduction easily predicted. “You look dreadful, John,” Sherlock said mildly, lowering the violin. “Even worse than usual.”

John’s heart hammered against his ribs as though it would break free. He was staring at the other man now, but it couldn’t be—it couldn’t be. His lips trembled and his voice came out strangled, climbing higher with each word:

“No. No, this—this isn’t—You’re dead. I saw you. You jumped, Sherlock. You died. I held your body—I watched—”

“Calm yourself,” Sherlock said softly, soothingly, and stepped forward once. Not close enough to touch, never that. His voice gentled into something almost pitying. “Isn’t it obvious?”

John’s stomach dropped. Obvious? His head spun, hangover pounding in his skull, the surreal sight before him twisting his gut until he thought he might be sick. His dead best friend—his everything—was standing in front of him, utterly unchanged. Smirking. Talking. Breathing.

“What the hell are you saying?” John choked. “Do you have any idea—I — We buried you, Sherlock!” He cut himself off with a ragged sob, dragging a hand across his face, trying to ground himself, to make sense of everything.

“My dear Watson,” Sherlock said finally, voice low and strangely tender. “I know you know what is happening. You’re a doctor. You understand. I’m not real. Only your mind keeps me alive.”

The words slammed into John like a bullet. He stared, uncomprehending at first, then shaking his head violently. “No. Shut up. Don’t. Don’t you dare—” He wanted to close the distance, to crush Sherlock in his arms and never let go—but what if there was nothing there? What if he reached out and touched only air?

A knock shattered the air.

John spun, heart slamming against his ribs, throat swollen with words he almost let spill: He’s back. He’s here, Mrs. Hudson. Sherlock’s alive.

“John?” Mrs. Hudson’s voice floated through the wood. “Are you all right in there? I heard shouting.”

For one impossible instant, John’s mind conjured what would happen if he opened the door and she saw Sherlock standing there. She would gasp, clutch the doorframe, eyes flooding. She’d rush forward and cry, “Sherlock! Oh thank God, you’re back!” She’d cradle his face, scold him, fuss over his thinness, and everything would be as it was before. The sitting room alive with noise, the smell of tea and biscuits and violin in the air.

John’s fingers tightened on the doorknob. He almost believed it.

But he knew.

He turned his head — just slightly, just enough to glance back over his shoulder. The man by the window stood silent now, bow lowered, head tilted as if waiting for him. The edges of his outline were wrong, too faint, like a photograph left out in the rain. His eyes glimmered with a strange, impossible sympathy.

John’s stomach sank. His heart, already broken, seemed to fold in on itself. He couldn’t open the door and tell Mrs. Hudson that he was hallucinating Sherlock Holmes. He couldn’t let her see him like this — unraveling, seeing ghosts in the flat they all used to share.

“I’m fine,” he said at last, forcing steadiness into his tone. “Sorry if I woke you. You can go back to bed, Mrs. Hudson.”

Silence. Then a soft sigh on the other side of the door.
“All right, dear,” she murmured, footsteps retreating.

John slid down until he was sitting on the floor, back to the door, knees drawn up. He wanted to scream. He wanted to confess everything. He wanted to believe the impossible.

But when he looked up again, the window was once again empty.

And so it went. For two years.

Sherlock stayed — and yet he didn’t.

The days bled into one another, quiet and colorless, like someone had turned the saturation down on the world. Morning came only because light slipped between the curtains. Night returned when he turned off the lamp. Everything in between was just… waiting.

Sherlock came and went as he pleased.

At first, John tried to rationalize it. Hallucinations. Stress-induced. Manifestations of trauma. He repeated the words like a diagnosis, clinical and detached, trying to convince himself they meant control. But soon, he stopped pretending. He couldn’t live with silence anymore. The silence pressed too hard on his chest, echoing through the hollow places Sherlock used to fill.

So he let the ghost stay.

The first months were almost kind.

Sherlock appeared as he always had—elegant, precise, unbearably alive. He’d sit in his chair, long fingers steepled beneath his chin, offering deductions about nothing at all: the neighbor’s dog, a passing stranger, the changing pattern of rain on the windowpane.

“You’ve stopped shaving again,” Sherlock would remark absently. “Regression is tedious, John. Try harder.”

John would snort, sometimes even smile. “You’re one to talk,” he’d mutter back, half-expecting a retort about grooming habits or laziness. It came every time.

Their conversations—imagined though they were—carried him through weeks. He began leaving space for Sherlock’s voice, pausing mid-sentence when he spoke aloud, as if allowing room for the reply.

Sometimes, when exhaustion blurred the edges of reality, it didn’t even feel strange. Just like old times.

But kindness never lasts, right?

The worst nights came when Sherlock blamed him.

“You should have stopped me,” the ghost hissed one evening, pacing the floor. “You knew I was going to die, and you did nothing.”

John’s breath hitched. “That’s not true.”

“You let me fall.”

“I—” His throat closed. “I tried. I did everything I could.”

Sherlock turned, eyes like winter. “Then why am I still dead?”

The room spun. The voice was his, but not his. It was guilt made flesh, grief given sound. John pressed his palms to his eyes until colors danced behind the lids, until the accusation faded and he was alone again—sobbing quietly into the silence.

Still, he tried to function, for a while. Therapy. Medication. Greg checking in, awkward but kind. Molly leaving food on his doorstep when she thought he wasn’t eating enough. Mrs. Hudson, hovering like a mother hen, pretending not to notice the extra cup of tea always waiting across from him.

He became a master at pretending. He never spoke to Sherlock in public, never let a flicker of recognition cross his face when the apparition appeared at his side on the street. He learned to nod at empty air without anyone noticing, to pause just long enough to make it look like thought instead of conversation.

He began drinking more. Not enough to forget completely—just enough to dull the edges. Sleep came in fits. Sometimes he woke up and found Sherlock sitting on the bed, watching him with something almost tender in his expression.

“Go back to sleep,” the ghost would whisper. “It’s easier there.”

And it was.

But every morning, the flat felt colder. The air staler. The light dimmer. Sherlock’s presence lingered like smoke, clinging to every wall, every thought.

John began to wonder if he was keeping Sherlock alive, or if Sherlock was keeping him. He told himself he could stop anytime. That one day, he’d take down the coat from its hook, fold it away, and move on.

But he never did.

It didn’t happen all at once, the breaking.

It was slow. A quiet erosion.

Until one day, John looked in the mirror and almost didn’t recognize the man staring back.

His eyes had sunk deep into his skull, rims raw and red from nights without sleep. The skin around them had gone greyish, papery. His hair, once clipped neat in military precision, now clung damp to his forehead, a dull blond gone to ash. An uneven stubble shadowed his cheeks, as though even the act of shaving had become too heavy, too pointless.

For a long time he just stared, gripping the edges of the sink. The man in the glass looked older than his years, like someone who’d been weathered by a war no one else could see.

This is you, he thought distantly. This is what waiting has done to you. And maybe, maybe it was time to stop waiting.

It was, once again, raining as he stepped out of the flat again. John thought bitterly how this story—their story—had begun: ironically, just as it would end, he chuckled darkly, while crossing the rain soaked street. It would end with John Watson, wandering the streets of london, propped up on a cane, no future and nothing to look forward to.

Only this time, he had a destination.

The gate creaked as he pushed it open. He followed the curved path until his shoes crunched to a halt in the gravel. Rain glistened on brilliant black marble, tracing the engraved name like freshly shed tears.

Sherlock Holmes.

John lowered himself onto the gravel, hand pressed to the stone for grounding. The coat wrapped around him like a shroud. He was so tired—tired of bargaining with his heart, of pretending he belonged in a world that had lost its axis. His palm flattened against the stone as if he could reach through it, as if on the other side Sherlock’s hand waited for his.

For once, he wasn’t trembling. The pistol lay across his lap, calm, obedient. He breathed in, slow and steady.

He then leaned forward, closing his eyes as the rain soaked him to the bone, as if even the weather was weeping with him. The barrel found its place against his temple.

“I’m coming, Sherlock.” I love you.

The barrel found its place at his temple. His finger tightened. For a heartbeat the world hushed—no rain, no city, only the ache of relief—before the thunderous release.

And then.

Silence.

“Shots reported at Highgate Cemetery. I repeat, shots reported.”

The radio suddenly crackled on Lestrade’s desk, making the detective inspector nearly spill his coffee. He had taken the late shift to catch up on paperwork but it was getting really dull. So he was already grabbing his coat, before even answering the radio. “DI Lestrade, I’ll look into it.”

Fifteen minutes later, the headlights of Lestrade’s car cut through the fog curling between the iron bars of Highgate Cemetery. Rain tapped a frantic rhythm against the windshield. The place was deserted—except for a figure waving frantically near the entrance.

Greg braked hard and stepped out, coat collar pulled high against the cold.

“Sir?” he called. “You’re the one who reported the shot?”

The elderly man turned toward him, face pale beneath the rain. “Yes—yes, I was visiting my daughter’s grave, just up the north path. Then I heard it—a loud crack. I thought it might’ve been fireworks, but then—” He stopped, trembling. “Then I saw someone by the old section. Didn’t move.”

Greg placed a steadying hand on the man's shoulder. “All right, it’s fine. You did the right thing calling it in. I’ve got backup on the way. Can you wait here until they arrive? I'm sure my colleagues want to write down your statement formally.

The man hesitated and then nodded. Before Lestrade could turn away, he grabbed his arm, whispering, “It sounded… close. Please—be careful.”

“I always am,” Greg said, gently peeling himself away from the old man, though his gut twisted as he said it.

He flicked on his flashlight and followed the path the man had pointed to. The gravel was slick beneath his boots, puddles reflecting the distant glow of the city. The deeper he went, the quieter it became—only the whisper of rain through the trees.

Then he saw them. Footprints. Fresh ones, deep in the wet earth.

Greg’s stomach dropped. The direction was unmistakable. He knew this part of the cemetery by heart.

“No,” he muttered under his breath. “Oh, please, no.”

The path curved sharply, and his torch beam slid ahead, catching on something—someone—slumped against a headstone. The outline of a man, a dark coat draped over him.

Lestrade drew his gun instinctively, his voice sharp and commanding through the downpour.

“Hey! This is DI Lestrade, Scotland Yard! Can you hear me?”

Nothing.

He took a step closer, boots sinking into the soft earth. The light trembled in his hand, sweeping over the figure. The coat glistened with water—no, with something darker. The rain hadn’t washed it away yet.

Greg knelt, heart hammering in his throat. He reached out, grasped the shoulder—

The coat slipped.

And Lestrade froze.

“God—no. No, no, no…”

John Watson.

He stumbled back, almost dropping the flashlight. His breath caught in his chest, the world narrowing to the still form before him. Blood streaked John’s temple, mingling with the rain. His face was upturned, calm—peaceful even, as if asleep in the shadow of the grave.

Sherlock’s grave.

One of John’s hands rested against the stone, fingers splayed as though reaching through it.

Lestrade’s voice broke in the quiet. “Christ, John… what have you done…”

He crouched again, trembling hands hovering uselessly above John’s shoulder, afraid to touch him. “You daft, stubborn—why didn’t you call me?! Why didn’t you…” His voice failed. There was nothing he could do anymore.

Lestrade’s jaw clenched, and with it also his heart. Deep breaths. In and out. Come on, you can't go into shock yet, he remindes himself. John needs—needed you. And you weren't there. So the least thing you could do now, is keeping it the fuck together, Greg!

By the time backup arrived—sirens wailing faintly through the mist—they found the Detective Inspector sitting motionless against a nearby tree, pale as a ghost. His hands were streaked with blood, his eyes fixed on the corpse sitting next to the grave.

John Watson and Sherlock Holmes.

Two men who couldn’t survive the world without each other.

And now, at last, they didn’t have to.

Chapter Text

London, Weeks Later

The blinds of Mycroft’s office were half-drawn, slicing pale afternoon light into neat bars across polished mahogany and crystal decanters.

Sherlock stood at the window. The faint tremor in his hands betrayed exhaustion, but his posture remained composed. Mycroft, meanwhile, sat behind his desk, with his fingers interlaced over a folder, expression carved into something unreadable.

“Well, brother mine,” he said at last, his gaze steady, “now that your little international charade has ended, what grand plan do you intend to follow through now?”

Sherlock pivoted sharply with a faint smile curling his lips. “My plan? Why, I’m going home, of course. To Baker Street. John will be insufferable with questions, but I’ll manage.”

He turned back toward the window, already lost in the shape of his deductions.

“I imagine Mrs. Hudson has kept the place relatively intact. The kitchen will be an abomination—John was never particularly diligent about the refrigerator—but I can repair that. He will be furious, of course, but his anger rarely lasts more than an hour if tea is involved. I’ll need to replace the—”

“Sherlock—”

The interruption was quiet but heavy. Sherlock stopped mid-sentence, turning his head just enough to catch the flicker in Mycroft’s eyes. A hesitation. Almost imperceptible. But Sherlock saw it. He always did.

His voice dropped, razor-sharp. “What is it you’re not saying?”

“John isn’t there.”

Sherlock blinked, frowning faintly. “He’s moved?”

“No.”

A pause stretched thin and unbearable.

“He’s gone.”

For a heartbeat, Sherlock’s face remained perfectly still. His eyes narrowed, calculating. “Gone where?”

Mycroft didn’t answer.

Sherlock’s voice grew harder. “Mycroft. Where?”

Mycroft closed his eyes briefly, as though bracing for impact. Then: “He’s dead, Sherlock.”

The words hit like a shot. The room seemed to contract around him. Sherlock stared at his brother, eyes flicking over every microexpression, every tremor in the jawline. Searching for the tell. There was none.

A bitter, broken sound escaped him—a laugh that wasn’t laughter. “You’re lying,” he said hoarsely. “Some ridiculous test, some psychological ploy. It’s absurd.”

“I’m sorry.”

The two words were soft, and they undid him more than anything else. Sherlock went utterly still. His face emptied.

“When?”

Mycroft looked at him as if silently begging him not to ask. But Sherlock’s stare was merciless and Mycroft, sighed, folding his hands, while he lowered his eyes to the desk.
“A month ago.”

“Damn it, Mycroft!” Sherlock's voice was trembling with fury. “You knew. You knew, and you didn’t tell me.”

“If I had told you,” Mycroft replied quietly, “you never would have completed the mission. You would have jeopardized everything. You would have gone back.”

“Then I should have!” Sherlock exploded, slamming his hand on the desk. “I should have gone back. He was all that—”

“I needed to protect you,” Mycroft cut in sharply, the mask slipping for the first time. “You were already walking on knife’s edge. If you’d returned, you’d be dead. I chose the mission because it was the only way to keep you alive.”

Sherlock staggered a step back, staring at his brother as if through water and scuffed. The Holmes brothers stared at one another, both waiting for the other to say something again.

The silence continued.

Suddenly, Sherlock pulled his gazw away and spun on his heel to storm out, leaving the office door shuddering in its frame. Mycroft slumped back into his chair, hands covering his face and mumbling to himself:
"What did I do?"

Baker Street

When Mrs. Hudson opened the door, she nearly dropped the teacup she was holding.

For a moment she simply stared. Then she reached out with a shaking hand, touching the face of the man infront of her as if afraid he might dissolve.
“Oh, Sherlock… oh, my boy… you’re alive. You’re really alive.”

Sherlock managed a faint, fragile smile. “I’m sorry for the fright, Mrs. Hudson.”

Her breath hitched, part sob, part laugh. “I should be furious with you,” she said, striking his arm weakly. “All these years—no word, nothing—do you know what you did to us? What John—”

She stopped herself, realizing. Her expression shifted, something grave creeping in. She wanted to tell him gently, to prepare him—but Sherlock’s eyes flicked over her face and he spoke before she could.

“Mycroft already told me.”

They looked at each other for a long moment, the weight of everything unsaid hanging between them. She lowered her hand, tears pooling in her eyes.

"I'm sorry Mrs Hudson but I have to go–," he weakly gestured towards the stairs and was already past her, taking the stairs two at a time, heart pounding.

The flat was unchanged. The air felt stale, Dust cloaked the surfaces, the bullet-pocked wall, the bookshelves. His chair sat empty. The other chair—John’s chair—still angled slightly toward it, as though waiting.

Sherlock crossed the room slowly, eyes cataloguing the faint outlines of absence—a mug on the table, a folded jumper on the couch, a cane leaning in the corner. But then his eyes fell onto John’s desk. On it sat a stack of letters bound with a thin ribbon.

The top envelope bore his name.
Sherlock.

He picked it up but didn’t open it right away. He simply pressed it to his lips, eyes closed. When he finally unfolded it, his breath caught. The handwriting was careful but uneven, as though the hand that had written it had trembled the entire time. 

Sherlock,

I’ve started this a dozen times and torn it up each time, because I never know where to begin with you. You always said sentiment was a chemical defect, but I think you were wrong. If it is, then it’s the only defect that ever made life worth living.

It’s been months now since you… since that day. Everyone tells me to move on, that it’s what you’d want. They don’t understand that there is no “moving on” from you. You filled every corner of this place, every minute of my life. You still do. Sometimes I swear I hear you—footsteps, violin, the scrape of a chair. Sometimes I answer. I think that would make you laugh.

I’m tired, Sherlock. God, I’m so tired. I keep telling myself I’ll get better, that the pain will fade. But it doesn’t fade...

And I miss you. I miss the arguments, the ridiculous experiments, the endless chaos of living with you. I miss the sound of you thinking. I even miss the way you made me feel small sometimes—because it meant you were there, and the world made sense while you were in it.

You once said that caring wasn’t an advantage. You were right. I cared. I still care. And it’s killing me.

I know you’ll never see this. But if somehow you do—if you’ve cheated death again, as you always seemed to—I want you to know that I forgive you. For leaving. For dying. For making me love you without ever saying it back.

You were the best and worst thing that ever happened to me.

Yours, always,
John

Sherlock’s hands trembled now too as he reached the end. The page slipped from his grasp and fluttered onto the floor like a feather.

He leaned back, the letter’s words echoing through the silence. Forgive you. Love you. Always.

He sat there for a long time, eyes fixed on the empty chair opposite. Outside, the city roared on—laughter spilling from pubs, taxis rushing past, windows glowing warm against the cold night.

But inside, the world had ended quietly.