Chapter Text
I wake up feeling hollow, and spend the morning vacillating between being convinced there had never been anything inside, and being certain it had been scooped out entirely.
After four days’ retreat in my hiding hole, I finally convince myself that I ought to at least buy a new loaf of bread. I’m not particularly interested in poisoning myself with mould. Not today, anyway. The trek to the corner store seems unremarkable. I'm still not sure when I drifted into this liminal space.
By the time I arrive to the till, loaf clutched in hand, I am feeling crowded. People had been shoving past me in the street, and I'd thought- All right, it's not the best part of London. Then at the cooler, another man had swooped in and nabbed the jug of milk I was about to take. Rude. But then the woman queued behind me (who'd been standing rather closer than customary) just barges along and slams down her basket of sundries when its meant to be my turn.
“Excuse me?” I spit. What am I? Invisible!? I hold back from saying, for the sheer petulance of the question. I can’t believe that this woman, looking sweet enough to be someone's gran, has just cut in like that. She didn't even blink. I mutter something inarticulate and gesture imploringly to the clerk. Her gaze was definitely facing in my direction, but there's no indication she'd noticed my confusion. My anything. I wave my hand in front of her face, before snapping back in shock.
I throw down the bread on a rack of impulse items and chewing gum and storm outside. I begin to feel a frantic bristling of nerves. No. Not a panic attack here in the street. In public. It's humiliating enough just facing my own self in the dark; sweating and shaken by anxieties that won't scatter no matter how many lights I turn on, or baths I draw, or walks I take. Has anyone ever been healed by such little things?
I scramble for my phone. If I call Harry, I’m convinced that being engaged with the conversation will inspire some responsibility in me to keep it together. I dig it out of my pocket and mash the keys to no effect. It must be jammed.
Walk. Just walk. I feel my feet accept the command, almost like I've got them on a leash. My head swims as I drag myself along. That’s what the feeling is like -weakly pulling myself along a life line. I’m not causing, I’m affected. I feel faded.
I find myself on the block in front of Barts, my old stomping grounds. The familiarity of the location stops me in my tracks, and the crowd begins to jostle me until I am nearly tackled full on. A rather heavy set man my own age looked bewildered, like he'd bounced off a glass door he hadn't noticed. Embarrassed. He pats himself down and in doing so notices something in his pocket. The look of exasperation tips me off. Mike - Mike Stamford from my school days. He'd shot me that look of exasperation all the countless times a professor had bored us, or a lab partner had flaked right before a deadline.
“Stamford! Stop, Mike...”
There was nothing for it; he can’t hear me any more than he can see me, apparently. He turns on his heel to head back into the building and I follow after him as quickly as I can. If someone is going to see me, it'd be someone I already had a connection with. Wouldn't it?
Mike ducks into a side entrance of the hospital, easily navigating left, left, and down one flight to the basement level. I wince when the door exiting a stairwell closes on my backside. He jiggles a few lab door handles, peeking into ones he must suspect contain what he was looking for.
A deep voice wafts from one as he opens it (Black, two sugars), and as soon as I follow Mike in to the room, he’s being lead away again by a young woman who’s on her way out.
“Molly! Glad I caught you. I forgot to pass these along to you before I went to lunch. Sorry about that.” He tosses her a set of keys and the door shuts behind them before I can duck back through. I grab the doorknob to exit, expecting to twist it open. When I throw my weight, the door won’t budge, and I feel my elbow crackle when my side pins it to the unmoving door.
“Their eyes pass right over you. You're not even being inconspicuous; if anything you look panicked. Even this lot ought to notice that you're on the brink of a nervous breakdown. How- Why can't they see you?”
I turn around to face the owner of the query - the deep voice from before. He's outrageous. Too much of everything. Too nicely dressed for a man his age, too much hair, too pale, too pronounced. Maybe they couldn't see me because he was in the room. He demands attention. And at the moment his attention is fixed on me.
“You can- You can see me?” I ask with a gulp.
I feel my stomach drop. It is by far the most concrete feeling I've had all day.
“I see everything,” he claims.
“It's, uh. It's been all day like this. Maybe longer, I stayed in the past few-”
I feel insane. I’m overreacting, at the very least. This incredible man can see me, so obviously everything up to this point must have been my own insecurity mixed with coincidence and declining civility of Londoners. I wrestle with the door again.
“May I?”
“Please!”
He gets up from the workbench and crosses in front of me - yet granting the only personal space I've experienced all day - and opens the door easily. I can't believe it. I tentatively put my hand to the door, and he releases his hold. The door opens easily enough. When draw my hand back it shuts on its own. Try the handle once more. Immovable.
“Interesting,” states the man.
Somehow- that soothes me. He's not panicking. I'm not panicked. Suddenly everything seems a bit funny to me. I start to laugh, and my tension drains considerably. He joins in, and then offers his hand.
“Sherlock Holmes. And your name?”
“What name do you like?” I offer, still laughing and ecstatic that I can feel someone's touch when my hand clasps his in a shake.
“John,” He says. As though he knows.
“Well, what a coincidence. My name happens to be John.”
*
I follow him all day. He insists he likes the company. People stare when he rambles to me, barely keeping his voice low. He’s brilliant, and seems to think I’m at least half as fascinating as I (privately) find him. It’s almost as good as being visible to chase along behind this madman. I appreciate that he can open doors (I’ll never point it out) although he chides me for not trying. He's a detective of some strange invented sort. He puzzles things out, and I feel myself hoping he'll figure me out as well.
When Sherlock notices the cabbie at the door of the flat he catches my eye and I follow. I know he's curious to uncover details he doesn't yet understand. We play along. It's rather fun being his shadow. It's even useful, when I point out the fake gun.
“You’re not the only one to enjoy a good murder. There’s others out there just like you, except you’re just a man ... and they’re so much more than that,” says the cabbie. I pace behind him.
“What do you mean, more than a man? An organization? What?”
“There’s a name no one says, and I’m not gonna say it either.”
I huff. I'm tired. He's hardly a threat with a fake gun and no muscle.
“Now, enough chatter. Time to choose,” he insists, nodding to two pill bottles.
“He's smart, Sherlock, but he's no match for you physically. Give him to the police and they'll put the screws to him.”
He shoots me a look that asks, The Name?
“It's not like he's gonna tell you something you can put into Google and get back a top result for,” I add.
“What if I don’t choose either? I could just walk out of here,” Sherlock admits. That's it. Let's go.
The cabbie raises the gun as though it ought to mean something, and Sherlock and I both start laughing. The idiot. The cabbie swings around in his seat and in that moment I'm certain he's seen me.
“The hell-” he starts. Instincts I haven’t had a chance to lean into since my return to London fire up. I lunge and lock an arm around his neck. I can do this. I can do this? I shouldn’t be able to touch anything at all, but I hold tight. I’m shorter than he is, but I kick out his knees from behind and pin him. I look up at Sherlock. Still grinning. Behind him, I can see the blink of police lights reflecting in the window around the steady line of his victorious shoulders. Like he’s sparking off magic. (But not my own reflection? Am I too low to the ground?) Sherlock whips out his phone to contact the Detective Inspector. It's an odd thing- and I banish the thought quickly, but it crosses my mind that whenever I laugh with Sherlock, I feel solid.