Connected

Disclaimer: I do not own Sherlock or any of the characters, they belong to the BBC, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and any other respective owners.

A/N: Well, I have to say, reading the Sherlock Holmes books as a child and watching the 21st century adaptation this year-it did not disappoint! And what do people like us do when we like a tv show? We write FF of course! Hope you enjoy, reviews much appreciated, this is AU x

Chapter One: I wish nothing ever happened to me

"Rebecca, please...John and Harry are trying to sleep!"

"You're the one whose shouting, Bernard! You started this tonight!"

"How did I start this?"

"You always start it! You always ruin my life and the kids and everyone's life around you!"

"How dare you? I'm trying my best to keep everything together! You're the one who said you don't want to be in this marriage any more."

John was sat in his room, 12 years old, hugging his Teddy Bear close to his chest and tears streaming down his face.

They always did this...they always argued, they always told each other they hated each other and John had to sit there and listen to it all. So did Harry, but John knew he couldn't go and talk to her, she didn't want to talk about it, she couldn't talk about it. And because of that, John couldn't talk about it either.

He just lay there, crying and cuddling Mr. Grizzly to his chest as they screamed and screamed and screamed...

...

16 year old John Watson woke with a start, sitting bolt upright and staring around the empty room, breathing heavily.

It took him a long moment to realise he was dreaming, and an even longer moment to berate himself for still having these dreams at all.

There was no screaming, not any more. Not since the divorce any way, he didn't have to deal with the screaming any more.

It was nights like this, however, that the ghostly silence was more unnerving to him.

John's parents had finally split up when John was 15, after years and years of fighting until they realised the relationship was just self-destructive. But in all honesty, John was still haunted with memories from it, not as often as he used to be but every now and then he'd have these dreams, these dreams that forced him to wake up in a cold sweat.

He sighed to himself and let his head fall into his hands, he knew he was too young to be so troubled by this sort of stuff, but he also knew it would never go away. John didn't know what he was supposed to do about it though, kids with normal lives wouldn't be worrying about this stuff but a kid with a normal life wouldn't have had to go through the things his family had gone through.

John had always thought that when his Mum and Dad finally split up it would be for the better, he might even get some sleep then, but the divorce itself had been very rocky. Each parent refusing to talk to each other, John having to be the go-to-guy between the pair of them.

But one of the biggest problems that had faced John was where he was going to live, for Harry it had been simple, she didn't really care but John didn't want to move away from either of his parents...sometimes he thought he cared too much. Sometimes he thought that was a good thing.

But times like this when he was sat in a cold sweat, fearing something that had happened a year ago; he thought that caring too much was definitely a curse.

John looked at the alarm clock on the side of his bed and saw that it was 5 minutes from going off at 7am, he closed his eyes tightly and let his head hit the pillow again, desperately trying to get any form of rest out of his exhausting night before he had to get up for school.

It was inevitable, though, in what seemed a matter of seconds his alarm sounded loudly from his bedside table and John groaned loudly.

He didn't hate school, it wasn't that at all, he just wasn't any good at operating on no sleep.

He didn't think it was fair.

He swung his legs over his bed and stood up slowly, rubbing the sleep from his closed eyes and reaching blindly for the alarm clock.

The alarm clock wasn't what he found though, his fingers skimmed over soft fur, he opened his eyes and looked down at Mr. Grizzly.

John turned the alarm off and picked his old Teddy Bear up slowly, he never slept with that thing any more, but he always kept him on his bedside table, within his sight.

It always seemed to John, even though he'd never tell anyone, that even though Mr. Grizzly couldn't speak and wasn't even alive, he was the only one who had been with John throughout everything.

John always believed that thinking that was easier than admitting how alone he actually was.

…

John was in the kitchen, still in his pyjamas, pouring milk into his bowl of cereal when his Mum walked into the room, fully dress, fishing around her hand bag for her car keys.

"Hey." Said John, barely looking up.

"Morning, Sweetheart." John's Mum, Rebecca, replied, sitting at the table and picking up the cup of coffee that had been sat there when John came in.

"How did you sleep?" She asked with an eyebrow raised as John leant against the counter and yawned hugely.

John shrugged, not wanting to tell her, he dug into his cereal more enthusiastically than he would have normally.

"Morning everyone." Came Stuarts voice suddenly as he walked into the kitchen, apparently looking for something.

"What have you lost?" Rebecca asked, glancing around.

"Car ke...oh! Found them!" He exclaimed, grabbing the aforementioned keys from the side.

"Hi John," said Stuart, turning away from John just as quickly. "We're going to that party at the Williams' tonight." He instructed, John watched as his Mother looked slightly taken aback and then composed herself with the fake smile John was growing accustomed to.

John scowled. Stuart was his Mum's boyfriend, and his Mum apparently loved him but that didn't mean John had to like him. Stuart always bossed his Mum around and told her what to do, and she never stood up for herself, John had never spoken to her about it but he assumed that she just didn't want to be in a relationship where she did nothing but fight again. But John's Father hadn't been a bad person, he and his Mum had just never been on the same page.

Stuart, on the other hand, was an arsehole.

"Hi." John said back, trying to appear friendly, but Stuart was out of the door without so much as a second glance to his girlfriends son, John rolled his eyes and decided not to waste precious brain cells thinking about it.

"Party?" Asked John politely.

"Yeah," Rebecca replied, suddenly sounding tired. "Some people Stuart know from work, he figured we should go out seeing as you're back at your Dad's tonight."

"Ah." John nodded,. Although his mind was way past the party now.

He was going to have to go back to his Dad's tonight.

He didn't want to go back to his Dad's and he hated himself for feeling that way.

It wasn't his Dad that was the problem, he loved him, but it was the fact that his Father was never there. His Dad was a barrister and all his time was taken up by one case or another.

The Watson's had come to a strange arrangement when it had come to living arrangements. Harry came and went wherever whenever she wanted, which was usually her boyfriends, but John spent one fortnight with his Mum and one fortnight with his Dad, which meant that when he had to go back to his father's house, he was stuck there for two weeks solid. But he tried not to let himself give it any energy, he tried desperately to remain the glass-half-full person he could barely remember.

…

At 3:20 that day John got to his Dad's and let himself in, slinging his school bag in the porch and kicking his school shoes off gratefully. John only had six months left off school, he always reminded himself that when he had a tough day.

But he quickly decided that wasn't necessarily a good thing when John remembered that after school he was just coming back to a big, empty house.

John quickly turned most of the lights on, he didn't have a thing against being green, he just preferred a light house to a dark one, it made it look at least a little bit lived in.

After that, John wandered around the house aimlessly for a few moments.

"Harry!" He called out, just to make sure, "Harry!"

When he got no reply, he concluded that his sister wasn't home. Which was a relief in some ways.

But in other ways it wasn't. John put the kettle on and walked to the porch to retrieve his school bag. He made himself a hot cup of tea, slung his school bad loosely over one shoulder and meandered up the stairs.

That was another thing about his Dad's house, he never knew what to do with himself there.

John was halfway through his History essay on the Cold war, and he got distracted from writing about the Soviet Invasion of Czechoslovakia when he heard a key in the front door.

Judging by the footsteps of the person who walked in it was John's father, Bernard.

John glanced to the clock in his bedroom at this house.

10pm.

John shook his head, realising that his Dad would be too tired to talk to now, so John just let him walk to his bedroom and close the door.

As soon as John finished his essay he crawled into bed, knowing he'd regret it if he lost sleep again that night.

Although he tried to drift off, for a good hour he kept one ear open to hear if Harry would come back that night, she never did.

John soon fell into a dreamless sleep only to practically do the same things tomorrow.

In a nutshell, John Watson hated his life.

I know, no Sherlock in this chapter, but I promise he'll be along soon to make John feel better x