Hello, hello! I've been bothered for a while about Watson's reaction to Holmes' sudden reappearance in "Empty House," because frankly, if my BFF pulled crap like that and came back from the dead three years later, I would be kind of disappointed in them, to say the least. So this plot bunny's been nibbling away at me for a while and I thought, what the hell. This is the product. Hope you like it. J

Disclaimer: I have nothing to do with anything to do with Sherlock Holmes. Unfortunately.

Mea Culpa

Three years is an awfully long period of time, for anything really. Three years is 94, 670, 778 seconds; 1, 577, 846.3 minutes; 26, 297.4383 hours, 156.532371 weeks, 1095 days, 36 months, and no less than 21 dog years. Three years is an awfully long time for anything, but three years is an especially long time to go about one's life thinking one's best friend is dead.

So when one's said supposedly-deceased best friend shows up at one's door three years after supposedly taking a header off a waterfall, looking very much alive and well, one is, of course, entitled to be just a little miffed at that person. It's human nature.

But of course, anyone who would fake his own death for three years without so much as a friendly text reading "I'm not dead LOL" and expect the person they left weeping at the edge of a waterfall to welcome them back, no questions asked, with open arms, would have to be entirely clueless when it came to human nature.

And that was just the sort of person Sherlock Holmes was.

So he was, of course, shocked when John's fist connected with his jaw and sent him sprawling to the floor. And he was shocked again when John joined him there about twelve seconds later, having toppled to the ground in a dead faint.

Sherlock couldn't for the life of him figure out what had come over his friend. Surely he hadn't changed that much since he'd left. The John he knew wouldn't hurt a fly, unless said fly was putting someone else in danger, in which case he would do some quite considerable damage to it. So, lost for answers, he rubbed his sore jaw and waited for his friend to wake up.

When he did, it was slowly, and confusedly. After much blinking and confused glances in Sherlock's direction and more blinking, realization slowly dawned.

"Sherlock...?" he asked in a low voice, shaking with supressed emotion.

"Hello, John." Sherlock said brightly, with the hint of a smile.

"But you're... you're alive..." John stammered, getting to his feet.

Sherlock stood too, and brushed himself off. "A very astute observation, John."

John blinked at him, his face suddenly losing all traces of emotion that had been there before. Sherlock noticed but didn't care.

"I suppose you're wondering how I survived the falls," he said, before launching into the story of how he'd nearly fallen to his death with Moriarty, but managed to regain his balance at the last second, climbed up onto a ledge, climbed back down, and skipped town for three years. By the time he finished, John had a most peculiar look on his face. Sherlock sighed. "You've got questions."

John stared at him for a long moment. For once, Sherlock couldn't read his expression. He guessed his friend was so overjoyed to see him alive and well that even he didn't know what to feel. He noticed John's left hand move slightly, and looked down at it, thinking that it was the tremor. But, no. It was simply clenching into a fist so tight that John's knuckles had gone white.

"You think I have questions?" John said in a carefully controlled voice.

"You always have questions, John." Sherlock replied with a smug smile.

"Alright. Here' s a question for you, Mr. Consulting Detective... what the HELL were you thinking?" The last part of the sentence came out in a most unexpected snarl.

"I assume you mean at the falls-"

"Of course I mean at the falls, you idiot! You're telling me you sat there all happy and chipper on a bloody ledge the whole time? I called for you! I was looking for you for hours before I could even consider that you'd di-"

John's voice faltered at the memory. Sherlock took the pause in the shouting to try and say something in his defence, but the look that John gave him was enough to do the impossible - to shut up Sherlock Holmes.

He'd never seen John look properly angry before. At any rate, he'd not seen the doctor's anger directed at him. Confusion? Yes. Disappointment? Of course. Exasperation? Obviously. But never anger. Never real, intense fury. The way John was looking at him right now, if he'd been able to, he would have burned two holes through the consulting detective by now.

"Don't. Say. Anything." John said in a dangerous monotone. "Just get the hell out."

Sherlock stared. Now it was his turn to be confused. Why was John acting this way? He didn't understand.

"Really, John, don't you think this is rather infantile-"

"Sherlock. Out. Now."

Unwilling to risk another blow (John really did have an impressive right hook; his jaw was still throbbing), and unable to think of a retort, Sherlock shuffled towards the door of John's tiny flat. As he entered the hallway, he turned back, expecting a goodbye, and only nearly getting his finger cut off by the slamming door for his troubles.

As he walked down the sidewalk towards Baker Street, he wondered to himself what had gotten into John. He was behaving quite irrationally.