Oh, darling make it go make it go away

Give me these moments give them back to me

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It was one of the other days and too early in the morning for John to have noticed that. He watched the telly while he ate cereal, padded round the house in his dressing gown and opened the fridge door with his foot, realising he had to go shopping again. He put his clothes on as if he was in a trance. Blissfully making his zombie-like way through the world.

John opened the door to 221b, about to close it behind him, and discovered Sherlock Holmes standing on the porch. His coat flapped in the wind, his hair ruffled by the breeze, but his face was so still he looked like an illustration. All he was was a picture book drawing, cut out and stuck down on the world in front of John.

Then he blinked.

John reached out to touch him but Sherlock caught his hand.

"Let me inside, don't react, just let me inside," Sherlock said. "We might be being watched."

Dazed, his blissful sleep walk shattered and in pieces at his feet, John stepped back into the flat. Sherlock got inside quickly and closed the door behind them. It was dark in the hall. Mrs Hudson was out and John never bothered turning the downstairs lights on anyway.

Shadowed, Sherlock looked even more like a spirit, his high cheekbones enunciated and his eyes skull-like hollows in the dark. His hair was shorter than John remembered and he looked even thinner than ever, but other than that he was exactly the man John had never been able to leave behind. He was exactly Sherlock Holmes and he was exactly what John needed.

He couldn't even feel astonishment yet. He just felt mad. He was sure he was dreaming or hallucinating. Maybe this was his way of trying to cope with the all the more pressing sadness on his mind. John couldn't believe that though. Something about the man in front of him was too vivid to be a dream.

"Where's Mrs Hudson?" Sherlock asked.

John opened and closed his mouth like a stunned child. Then he shook himself. "Out. Shopping."

"Fuck," Sherlock muttered, one of the few times John ever heard him swear. "Best to stay away from windows for now," he murmured. "Too easy a target there."

"Target?" John frowned.

"Target," Sherlock nodded. Only then did John realise that Sherlock was looking over the top of his head, not meeting his eye.

"Oh. Whose target?" he asked.

"Sebastian Moran's," Sherlock replied. "Hired by Moriarty to shoot you if I didn't jump. He was working for someone else at Brecon Beacons, I shouldn't have realised it was his signature flair with the snipers, but I was an idiot. I thought I could solve the case with no one noticing I was there. But he saw me so he realised he had to shoot you."

"It was you in the hills? You helped me out or the wires?" John asked. The humming policeman. He must have been Sherlock too.

"Yes," Sherlock replied shortly, still not looking at him. "I had to die all over again," he said, rolling his eyes as if death was some tiresome chore that couldn't be avoided. Which- John supposed- it was. "I shouldn't have come back."

John punched him. Careful to avoid his nose and teeth, but it was a very hard punch all the same. Not quite enough to make up for three years though, so as Sherlock turned his head back to protest John hit him again. And again. And again. Until Sherlock was on the ground, arms raised over his head in a feeble and almost accepting attempt to soften the blows. John found himself in tears as he kicked and punched and elbowed and kneed Sherlock wherever he could. His heart felt too absent to feel happy.

"Fucking three years!" John yelled.

"Shhh!" Sherlock protested. "Snipers!"

John didn't care. "You'd better hope they kill you before I do!" "But I've just come back to life!" Sherlock protested weakly. "For the second time!"

"I DON'T CARE!" John bellowed, pinning down Sherlock's writhing arms. "I DON'T CARE. I WANTED TO DIE, I WANTED TO DIE BECAUSE YOU WEREN'T THERE."

"SO DID I!" Sherlock bellowed back, even louder, apparently forgetting his own cautions. "I ALWAYS HAD EVERY INTENTION OF RETURNING, JOHN, DON'T YOU SEE?"

A person only really seems real to you when you see their loose ends. The frayed ends of their string. The wounded, lost and wandering parts of them. Sherlock was pinned, with no protest, to the ground beneath John looking desperate and angry and sad and scared all at once. All the things he never showed before in one expression. In one shout. One bullet through John's heart.

"Sherl-" John began to shout again but Sherlock interrupted him. "Snipers, quiet," he reminded him.

John rocked back on his heels and covered his face in his hands. He could feel his body shaking but the last of his tears had been spent so long ago.

"This can't be real," he whispered. "No. No. This cannot be real, you aren't real."

"I am. I am real. I wish I wasn't but I am and I've discovered there is very little I can do about that," Sherlock said. John lowered his hands and stared at him. His friend seemed to jump out at him from the hall, even though he sat still. He seemed to glow, or exist in greater detail than was possible for a human.

"Where did you go?" John asked in disbelief. "Why did you go?"

"Moriarty hired three hit-men to kill my best friends if I didn't jump off that roof," he said. "If I didn't kill myself. One bullet for Mrs Hudson, one for Lestrade and one for you. They were going to kill you if I didn't make them believe I'd died," he said, gazing desperately at John. "I've been saying for years and years that love is a dangerous disadvantage but you had to bloody go and be my friend, didn't you? You had to go and get a gun pointed at your head- oh, I shouldn't have come back they're only going to do it again. I have to go-"

"Don't you dare," John grabbed Sherlock's wrist as tightly as he could. "Don't you even fucking think about it. How could you just leave me? Couldn't you even contact me?"

"It was a risk I couldn't take," Sherlock shook his head. "We were being observed without our noticing for months, Moriarty could have hacked your phone too. Besides, I thought it'd be easier on you-"

"In what universe is tricking me into thinking you were dead easy?" John exploded.

"I was coming back!" Sherlock roared. "I didn't think it would take me three years, I didn't count on how clever Moran is. I thought he died in Tibet, I thought I could finally come back. Back when you were investigating Brecon Beacons I was planning on returning to Baker Street, finally returning to you. I even got rid of the tourist, rigged the lottery for him twice. I came back to the flat every other month to check you hadn't damaged any my stuff, my violin or my notes. I got all my equipment back from the school-"

"That was you? I thought it had been stolen, I was furious-" John interrupted.

"It was me," Sherlock nodded. "They call themselves a secure learning foundation, really. I had half a mind to pinch one of their microscopes, encourage them to get some finger print recognition software that can't be fooled by a little make up wipe and-"

He stopped upon seeing exactly how dazed John looked and he smiled fondly. "Oh, it's been a long time since I've had someone to baffle like that. Odd what one misses about a person, isn't it?" he beamed but then his expression became earnest again. "You see, I always had every intention of coming back, John."

It had been so very long since John had heard Sherlock say his name. He had always imagined it, thought he could Sherlock calling him from the other room or across the road but when he'd looked there had been no one. Now Sherlock flooded his sense. He really was there. He was alive.

"Oh thank god," John murmured finally.

Sherlock frowned but John just ducked his head and decided that the people were always going to bloody well talk so he may as well do something to prove them right. He kissed Sherlock in the way you draw a circle then realise it's not quite connected at the ends. You ink the last little, curving line in carefully and tentatively but purposefully all the same. Complete it with something so simple. It was simply what they hadn't realised what was missing til now.

Maybe it took three years apart, two faked deaths, and one bullet to the shoulder to do it but they finally finished it. Neither of them were surprised. Not shocked or clumsy or awkward. It just happened, as it was always going to. Sherlock cupped his cheek and kissed him back with tender intensity, so proud to be kissing him but careful to do it right

Unseen, a red dot flickered on the window pane of the door above their heads.

Chapter thirteen and the last chapter of this little thing is over! Does this prove thirteen to be a lucky or an unlucky number? Do tell me in the comments, I'd love to hear what you thought of this brainfart of ideas. Thanks for reading this far, darling, and thank you for putting up with the mistakes of horror only paralleled by their number, I know. I hope I haven't ruined Sherlock for you.

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