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It is blisteringly cold, the kind of cold that seeps into John Watson's bones and makes him feel ten years older. That's ten years he doesn't need tacked on to his 67, thank you very much, and he will either freeze to death out here on the sidewalk or find someplace to get warm.
The answer comes to him as he turns the corner: the old Criterion bar, still a venerable old landmark in this rapidly changing city. It’s as good a place as any to obtain a decent cup of tea and rest his tired old feet.
As he opens the door, he is jostled aside by a group of young men, all in their early- to mid-thirties, nattily dressed for the cold weather: city boys, by the look of them. Only one of them – tall, slender, with very dark curls – stops for John, putting his hands upon the older man’s arms to steady him.
“Are you all right, sir?” he asks, the voice deep and rich, the concern genuine.
John huffs impatiently. “You might tell your friends to watch where they’re going.”
The young man doesn’t release him until he’s completely satisfied that John is all right. “I must apologise on behalf of my … friends,” he says quietly. “They have imbibed rather too much, and it’s not even sundown yet.”
John smiles in spite of his annoyance; the man’s posh diction and polished vocabulary, not to mention his height and hair and clear gray eyes, remind him very much of someone dear.
“I suppose when you’re my age, you become part of the scenery,” he sighs wearily. “Go on, then. You don’t want your mates to leave you behind.”
The young man smirks. “Don’t I?” He holds the door open for John to pass through. “Have a good evening, sir.” He closes the door, turns up the collar of his coat against the cold outside, and disappears down the street.
Remarkable, John thinks to himself.
An attendant comes up to him, directs him to a small table in a quiet corner near a window. The Criterion had been renovated several years ago, but this is the first time John’s seen the changes. On the whole it’s much improved and very pleasant: leather chairs, warm woods, a large fireplace, modern glass chandeliers and light fixtures. Classic and contemporary at the same time, not that John really cares; he’s content with a comfortable seat and a proper cuppa.
A waiter comes when he beckons, and he asks for tea and some biscuits.
When the waiter leaves, there is a shuffle of newspapers from the occupant of the table across his.
“John Watson, it has been entirely too long.”
He’d know that voice anywhere, even after nearly a decade, and John finds himself rising out of his seat. “What the – Sherlock? Sherlock Holmes, is that you?”
The man at the other table rises as well, and John’s heart lifts. It is Sherlock indeed. Same mischievous gleam in the gray, liquid-crystal eyes. Same head of untamed curls, except they’re now mostly silver. But he’s even thinner now, if that were humanly possible; there is a slight stoop to his shoulders, and his fine, pale skin seems almost transparent, stretched thin over the delicate bones of his face.
“Let me get a good look at you, John,” Sherlock says in that distinct baritone, as John gives him the most enthusiastic double-handed handshake in the history of handshakes. “Why, you haven’t changed one bit!”
“Except for the extra five kilogrammes, which you couldn’t possibly have missed,” John quips. He gazes up at Sherlock in wonderment. “I can’t believe it. What are the odds?”
“Would you like me to calculate them for you, John, or was that a purely rhetorical question?”
“Shut up, you idiot,” John snaps in mock exasperation. “Sit down, sit down. I haven’t seen you in ages.”
“Aeons, John,” Sherlock thunders at him; clearly he's not lost his flair for the dramatic. “Entire civilisations have sprung up, flowered and died in the interim. What have you been doing with yourself?”
“Not much – puttering in the garden, consulting at the local surgery. The girls are married now –“
“Ah,” Sherlock nods. “Yes. Of course. The youngest has just had a baby. That’s what brings you to London in this unholy weather, am I right?”
“Bloody hell, Sherlock, I thought you might have deleted the girls. Not to mention you’re still showing off at your age.”
“I wouldn’t waste the opportunity,” he chuckles, “particularly as I seldom have an appreciative audience these days.” He adds wistfully: “And I certainly would not delete anything that had to do with you."
John looks at his old, dear friend in the soft glow of the Criterion’s lamps. Sherlock remains an impeccable dresser, and his hair has not thinned at all. But he’s changed profoundly, as John himself has; they’ve both become old men.
"You're looking well," he says quietly.
"Surely you could have made more productive use of these last ten years by improving your lying prowess a bit?"
John giggles, something he’s never outgrown. "And you're still as sharp as a box of fresh razor blades. What do you do out there in Sussex? I heard some outlandish rumour about bees."
"The grapevine is accurate for once. Yes, I keep bees at the farm. Fascinating creatures. I wrote a monograph – oh, I don’t suppose you’d be interested. But it was rather well-received in certain circles.”
“Well, of course I’d be interested, you old git. I plowed through your analysis of tobacco ash, remember? Where can I get my hands on it?”
Sherlock looks pleased. “I’ll be sure to send you a copy.”
A waiter comes with John’s tea and a plate full of biscuits. They wait in silence until everything is laid out and the waiter departs. Sherlock watches John sip his tea. Those hands of his, even after all these years, remain utterly steady: the hands that had made him endless cups of tea a whole lifetime ago, that aimed a gun at a murderous cabbie to save his life, that reached out to him as he stood on the rooftop of St. Barts after that terrible final confrontation with Jim Moriarty. Sherlock laces his own fingers together tightly, tucks his hands in his lap where they can’t be seen behind his crossed legs.
John puts his cup down, looks at his friend, shakes his head. “How did we lose touch, all these years?" he asks, genuinely puzzled.
Sherlock frowns slightly. “It would have been … unreasonable … to expect that our paths would always proceed in the same direction. You had your family and your work and I … well, after Lestrade’s retirement and passing, there was little to keep me in London.” He smiled, that small, brittle smile John still recognises as an expression of sadness. “And you know how I am. I have never found the company of most people tolerable. I love London, and always will. But I needed to get away from the city; it was time.”
John leans forward earnestly. “I’ve been a terrible friend to you, Sherlock. I’ve let too much time pass without even writing or calling. It’s simply unforgivable.”
Sherlock’s breath hitches, but he recovers his composure quickly. “What on earth are you talking about, John? True friendship does not diminish with time or distance. Surely you must know … “ He breaks off, resumes, this time more firmly. “I cannot have you thinking that you have been a terrible friend. It's rubbish, I won't have it.”
“It’s just – life, you know? You get busy and it all runs away from you.”
“You owe me neither explanation nor apology. I, too, have -- as you say -- gotten busy. Allowed things to run away from me.” He reaches for his cup again, and John notes for the first time that there is a slight tremor in his right hand.
“How’s your health these days, Sherlock?”
Sherlock rolls his eyes, something that makes John want to laugh and weep at the same time. “You’re applying my methods to me, are you? Very well. It’s Parkinson’s, as I’m sure you’ve deduced. I’m on medication, and today is a rather good day. But it’s a rare good day. I can no longer play the violin; I can’t steady the bow enough.”
John feels his chest tighten. Sherlock had always seemed invincible, immune to age and illness. When he returned from the dead nearly thirty years ago, John had been convinced that nothing could destroy or diminish him.
But of course he was wrong, and the knowledge causes him the keenest pain.
“And you?” Sherlock asks.
“Well, the usual aches and pains. And I have an enlarged heart,” John answers. “Considering a bypass at some point, but it won’t kill me just yet.”
“An enlarged heart,” Sherlock murmurs. “John Watson’s heart has always been very large. The largest I have ever encountered in a human being. It surprises me no end that it could possibly grow even larger.”
“Sherlock.”
The other man takes a deep breath, then beams, and suddenly John is transported back to Baker Street, sitting across from a young man whose truest smiles were made all the more beautiful by their rarity. “Forgive me, John. Perhaps I’ve grown soft in my old age. Tell me, are you still on the board at Barts?”
"Yes, not that I'm much use to them. I turn up at meetings and vote on things. All very mundane, it would drive you batty."
"And is Molly Hooper still there?"
"Molly is ... “ He hesitates. “She has Alzheimer's. I visited her once, about a year ago. Went with her son. Decent chap, has her eyes." John looks into his teacup as though it holds some crucial secret of life. "She couldn't remember him. Or me. But when I mentioned your name --"
Sherlock lifts his eyes. "My name?"
"I asked, 'Do you remember Sherlock?' and she gave me the biggest smile, bright as a ray of sunshine."
"Did she say anything about me?"
"No. But the attendant said it was the first thing she'd really responded to in over a month." John sets down his cup and threads his fingers together in his lap. "She always had a thing for you."
Sherlock doesn't speak for a while. When he does, all he says is: "Molly Hooper."
They sink into the silence again, John sipping his tea. Around them, the Criterion is filling up, mostly with younger people, just coming off work, stopping by for a drink, meeting their friends.
“How is old Mycroft?” John asks.
Sherlock doesn’t answer for a while. Then he says quietly, “He passed away earlier this year.”
“Oh, Sherlock. I am so sorry.” John pauses. “Did the two of you ever … you know?”
“Patch things up?” Sherlock smiles. “There was never really much to patch up, John. For all our differences, Mycroft was my brother and my blood. Whatever he did that annoyed me – his constant meddling and prying -- he did only with my very best interests at heart. In the end it was … Good. Between us.”
His face brightens. “And his boys have grown into fine young men! Oh, John, I wish you could meet them. I am … so very proud. In fact, the younger one was here with some former colleagues just before you arrived. He’s quite brilliant, really, but as you can imagine, a solitary boy. But much better socialised than I or Mycroft ever were.”
John’s heart quickens as he remembers the young man who stopped for him at the door. “Gregory, yes? Works in finance? ”
“Yes to the first, no to the second. He left the industry two years ago, with Mycroft’s blessing. He now heads a division in the Serious Fraud Office.” Sherlock’s pride shines in his face. “He consults me from time to time on his more complex cases. That is actually my reason for being in the city today.”
John smiles. “Yeah, I’ll just bet Mycroft was chuffed, knowing his boy was following in your footsteps.”
A wicked grin makes Sherlock look decades younger. “I may have needled him about it occasionally, yes.”
They both laugh like naughty schoolboys, but soon lapse into another silence.
John glances outside the windows at the darkening sky, and then at his watch. "Look at that. I can't believe how late it is. I guess I'd better go -- train to catch." He fumbles for his wallet, leaves a few notes on the table.
Sherlock sets his cup down with great care, and despite this, the tremor in his right hand causes cup to clatter against saucer.
"It has been such a great pleasure to see you again, my old – my dearest friend," Sherlock says, his voice barely above a whisper. He rises to his feet at the same time that John does, and holds out his hand.
"What, are you joking?" It comes out more hearty and enthusiastic than John feels; indeed, what John actually feels is a rending of his heart similar to that black day at St. Barts so many years ago, its sharpness and intensity unblunted by age or time. "This is no time for a mere handshake, Sherlock Holmes." And he envelops his friend in a great, warm embrace. As he expected, Sherlock stiffens at first, but as John refuses to let go, he relaxes into it, and his arms come up around John's back.
"No, it isn't," he agrees, his cheek resting in John's soft hair. "A handshake won't suffice."
John holds on a beat longer than he needs to. Sherlock's body, always so trim and streamlined, feels so terribly fragile to him, old bones in old skin, but perhaps that's just how his body feels to Sherlock as well. Time has caught up with them, and age, and life: the things that pressed upon them that were not tied to the sweet, heart-stopping madness of their lives in Baker Street, the things that had somehow become more important than chasing after criminals and foiling conspiracies and pursuing justice. The Baker Street they knew as young men is no more, and the young men they had been at Baker Street are long gone. Mycroft and Lestrade and Mrs Hudson are dead and buried, Molly in a nursing home with no memory of the past.
How slowly the time had seemed to trickle by, then; but seen from the opposite end, how it all seems to have passed in the blink of an eye.
"I mustn't detain you any longer than necessary," Sherlock says, his voice breaking a little.
John releases him finally. "Do you think you might someday make the trip then, to come and visit?" he asks hopefully. "Or, I could come and see you. See those bees."
Sherlock reflects on this a moment, then finally says, "At my age and in my … condition, traveling is no longer as agreeable as it used to be. But let us see whether my constitution improves in the summer. As for my little farm in the South Downs, you know you are always welcome."
They both wrap themselves up in their coats and scarves, and walk together in silence toward the door. They’re greeted by a blast of cold wind, and John turns to Sherlock and grasps both his friend's hands in his own.
“Sherlock, I –“
Sherlock shakes his head vigorously, the wind lifting his silver curls. “I’m afraid this weather will not permit a long leave-taking, John. But this last hour with you has been ... most precious to me.”
John’s eyes are wet with tears that he doesn’t even notice. “And to me, as well, Sherlock.”
Sherlock is the first to step back and John does the same. Sherlock nods, and John takes it as his cue to turn and walk away. Night is falling fast and soon they will be enveloped in darkness; but not just yet.
John stops, turns and waves at Sherlock one last time. They stand on the sidewalk in the bitter chill of London's winter, in the deepening twilight of the city, gazing upon each other's well-loved, aging faces. They smile, and in their smiles all the treasured weight of their friendship, their shared history and the final farewell that neither of them has the heart to say.
That night, Sherlock sits by the fireplace in his hotel room and weighs carefully in his mind whether he wants to remember John as he saw him on the sidewalk that evening.
It is almost dawn when he finally decides not to delete the memory.
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The lovely qinwuxin1978 has translated this story into Chinese here.