Sherlock Shows
Aftermaths are tough. They reside on the steaming stillness of resolution.
Sherlock is looking out his window with the violin hanging from his fist limp, the last chord ringing through apartment. Shellshocked.
It’s been more than a week now since they lived the nightmare that Eurus planned for them. He’s been there twice already. Once on his own, the strangest visit where they just looked at each other and he played music, until her patience grew thinned, and she followed… followed? Not really, she led. But it meant communication and communication was better than nothing. The next time, Mycroft had finally agreed to arrange for a visit with his parents. He had never seen his mother scream so much at Mycroft. Now things were running along nice on their riverbeds: Eurus was secured, John was safe, his parents knew the truth of Mycroft’s and Rudy’s actions. Uncle Rudy had died a few years ago in the nursing home he had committed himself to. Uncle Rudy had missed the grand finale. But what about Mycroft?
Mycroft had been the direct object of Mrs Holmes’ rage when they found out but his dad, in his usual calm and content manner, had just stared in disbelief that his eldest boy, seven years older than Sherlock, had calculated so young and managed to apply and conspire in such a risk assessment so cold and narrow to his own little sister. Cold blood definitely ran through the Holmes family.
The facts were against Eurus. She had been involved in the death of a boy who had been never found. The Trevors had vanished after Victor’s disappearing act and Sherlock, now, looking at the window had to exercise a certain amount of self-control to not go and try to find them, to confess the whole thing. Mycroft had sensed it and after they had got off the helicopter from Sherringford the last time, he had given Sherlock that interrogating look that lingered on the ‘for what’ question. Eurus had tried to hurt others: John today. She had killed men… that were not exactly innocent, but she had killed them in cold blood. She had collaborated with Jim Moriarty. What Sherlock couldn’t help dancing around was her motives. Moriarty had wanted Sherlock dead, and Eurus had wanted to meet with Moriarty, but for what?
And yet, Sherlock couldn’t blame her. Not fully. There was something that didn’t sit well deep inside; and he knew that for some reason Mr Holmes Senior had already arrived there, at the same conclusion, and was sitting right there with him at the bottomless pit of confusion flattened by the fog of unclear memories. His mother stood outside this circle, a wordless bond between father and son. She was probably standing in the midst of terror, guilt, and pain. The pain of not being able to do anything for the ones you love, regardless of how deserving they are of any love.
Sherlock flinches and leaves the violin on the bureau that’s cleaner than usual because there are no cases, and there is no will open the computer and go through any potential cases. Nothing will compare to what they have just lived and he’s in no mood for a 2 or a 3. Love for the undeserving. Love. A word that some of us find difficult to say out loud and when we let it out, it’s not without the fear of breaking it, of letting it drop, of using it too much. His eyes dart around the living room as if he were missing something, but he’s not sure what. His mother’s guilt probably stems from the hours she had spent on calculus instead of watching her three kids, directly from the fantasy that parents can always intervene timely and productively in the lives of their children. He saw the fear in John’s eyes when they pulled him out of that well. It wasn’t fear for his own life, but for the life he would leave behind. He shakes his head and his hair. He needs a haircut, but he doesn’t feel like going to the barber’s. He doesn’t like the feel of the scissors and the thought of having someone touch his head now makes his skin crawl and his skeleton cringe. He hasn’t left the house - Has he changed clothes? – since they arrived from Sherringford a few days ago. Mycroft took his parents to his own house after that ceremonious failure of a dinner in that overprized French restaurant. French food doesn’t go well with identity jigsaws, and what had just happened had shattered them all one by one and the pieces of each of the members of the Holmes family now were lying in the middle of the dinner table for them to reconfigure. His parents went back to their house in the countryside the next morning as Mycroft had informed him via text in his curt manner. The agreement was to visit Eurus once a month. But for what?
He feels his stomach rumble and knows he should eat. It’s past noon and he hasn’t eaten since dinner, and this is by far the longest he’s gone without food. He normally doesn’t eat while on a case because it slows his thinking and right now he doesn’t want his thinking to speed up. He’s not sure where this train of thought may lead, if you can call it train of thought, because it definitely feels more like thought rack, pulling each lobe in a different direction.
Without a second thought, he stands up and grabs his coat walking out. He can hear Mrs Hudson’s radio as she is probably hoovering, although no sound of hoovering comes through as he walks past her door, but he doesn’t stop. He walks out in the pouring rain and runs to the tube. He can go elsewhere to eat. Anywhere, he follows no plan and gets on the first train that arrives at the underground platform. Jubilee line. It’s busy so he can manage to blend into the crowd and fade into the background. After 5 stops, he gets off in Southwark and walks on Union street to Great Suffolk street. He’s not sure why he’s going to Tate, but they do serve a nice coffee. It will be busy and if he feels prone to observe some art, he normally prefers to do it in the quiet, but he has followed instinct, which right now seems to be the tail end of the survival instinct he had to apply religiously in Sherringford for his sister’s escapade. Like any tree after a red alert, he feels spent and hollow.
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Molly has finished washing up the dishes. Rosie, John, and she have had a late lunch, mainly made of cream of vegetable, fresh bread, and an insanely varied amount of cheese. Rosie dominated the conversation and after her belly got her fair fill and her chatter subsided, Molly took her upstairs for a story and a nap. When she came down, John was watching a film. He stopped the TV when she came into the living room. ‘Any plans?.’ She did not have any. She wanted fresh air. She did not want to have the conversation that had been lingering in the air since she had arrived, so she opted for the way out. ‘Yeah… I’m meeting a friend.’ John raises his eyebrow. ‘A male friend?’ She had lied, bluntly. She had no plans and definitely she was not meeting any friend. Now John was asking further questions. ‘No.’ When she was little, her brother Simon and her had taken Pinocchio to a different level. They had managed to convince themselves that when you tell lies, especially self-fulfilling lies, they become true in the most twisted and wicked ways to punish the liar. Be careful what you lie about, Molly!
- It’s okay if you are… I won’t tell – John smiles.
- Erm…
- It’s okay to meet new people… how long has it been since Tom?
- Six months now.
- It’s perfectly all right to start dating – John mansplains even though he’s not really trying. He hears himself say it out loud and cringes at his own words -. I’ll shut up now.
Molly is putting on her coat and buttoning it up. It’s a patchwork coat filled with colours that she hasn’t worn in ages. John smiles at Molly’s signature style.
- I’ve left a cottage pie in the fridge for dinner and the chocolate chip and carrot muffins that Rosie likes are in the tin…
- And Sherlock…
- What? – Molly looks up.
- Sherlock likes them too.
- Oh. Right. Yeah… anyway, I’m gonna go. Call me if you need anything.
- Same, Molly – John gets up as Molly grabs her bag and walks out. – Have fun with your friend.
Molly nods and walks down to the bus. She has no idea where to go, what to do, but she knew one thing for sure. She needed to get out. John’s house had started to become oppressive, and she knew that if she stayed longer the walls would close in and the conversation that she has masterfully avoided would rise up from the ground. She walks down Clarence Gardens and Munster square towards the Circle Line on Great Portland Street. She considers briefly taking a longer walk to Baker street and confront Sherlock. She smiles. She knows nothing good comes about from cornering the detective. Or at least it has never worked for her.
‘Black, two sugars’
She smiles. She’s not the same naïve pathologist that asked him out for coffee. But she’s no way forward and she feels like she’s sinking further into the pickle jar Eurus has forced her into. She steps into the tube and sits down thanks to a sleezy flirty older gentleman that seems to be going out of his way to catch her eye after letting her sit down. Luckily, he gets off at King Cross St Pancras. She’s not sure what makes her get off at Blackfriars and walk along the Thames Path to Tate fast because the rain is on and off and the coat she’s wearing is not exactly rainproof, if anything it’s a rain sponge. She rushes to the entrance but doesn’t go in yet. There’s something unnervingly soothing about the river. She recalls the years in medical school, after she had chosen her specialization, in which they would receive countless bodies, unclaimed, from the river. And that boyfriend, the archaeologist who used to bring her when he worked on the Dig. That’s it. She smiles and shaking her coat off her shoulders she walks into the wonderful building that makes everyone feel insignificant and tiny. She takes the stairs to Mark Dion’s cabinet of curiosities where his Dig (1999) displays the oddities that have been spewed from the river. She approaches it, along as it is in the room, with reverence and awe, like she did when she first heard about the project. The room where it is looks empty. Most of the visitors are more attracted by the bigger names, the painters, the sculptors with names that educated artists trade in these days. She walks to the cabinet and opens the first drawer, delving into the depths of the coins, the notes, the syringes, the centuries breathing through the river… Her focus blocks out any noise, any shadow and so she doesn’t realize that she’s not alone. Not at all. The room may look empty, but it isn’t.
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On the other side of the double-sided cabinet, Sherlock had been examining an old clay pipe when he heard the footsteps of a lady arriving at the same room. He would have rather been left alone but he didn’t have a choice and if he hadn’t been so focused on the object at hand and the shoes hadn’t squelched so much after the rain she had been running under, he may have recognized the distinct arrhythmical walk, the slight skip at the end of her step when she was excited, but he hadn’t. He had remained silent, the same as the newcomer on the other side of the cabinet, who’s silent could have indicated she had teleported or some such… very few people were capable of such profound silence. He looks up after this thought creeps inside his brain and walks around the cabinet.
_____________________________
She was a bit startled by the sound of footsteps because she had convinced herself she was alone. Her adrenaline had over-surged to levels beyond any real threat, and she was looking towards the right side of the cabinet because she was certain the footsteps were leading there. She almost darted to the other side of the cabinet, but she thought it would look foolish, stupid, to engage in a weird childish game of catch around the cabinet, but her eyes looked alert, ready to run, calculating the possibilities for fight or flight, when their words collided.
- Hello Molly
- Sherlock. – and after she recovered – fancy meeting you here.