(no subject)

[nervesofsteel]

Once, John would have never believed that someday, he might find himself in a therapist’s office completely of his own volition, without the slightest bit of prodding, or poking, or not-so-subtle encouragement. When he had first gotten back from Afghanistan, forced out of his army, out of his war, back into a life he no longer recognized, his sessions with the army psychiatrist had been mandatory and blessedly briefly. He had found Ella at the insistence of friends and, more importantly, a former commanding officer that he was loathe to disappoint, but he had looked on her with near-insulting skepticism and offered only reticence and quips. People like John Watson don’t talk about their feelings.

Then, when he had lost everything once again - when he had lost Sherlock - he had gone back to Ella, and somewhere along the way, he had begun to truly listen to her. Her questions were prying, but made him think, her assumptions annoying, but often correct. Mary, too, as they had gotten to know one another and he had revealed little crumbs of his inner demons, seemed to instinctively know how to ask about his appointments, how to subtly ensure that he went without ever putting him on his guard. Somewhere along the way, therapy had become normal - as long as he doesn't think about it very much.

Now he’s in Darrow, and he has a wife, and a daughter, and a regular job, and he’s okay with that. More or less. But he has to stay okay with it, that’s his responsibility now, and that’s why he’s here in this nondescript waiting room, flipping through a magazine filled with the face of Todd Chadd, and articles about the latest Tiffany Charlotte Memorial Something-or-other. He still doesn’t truck in feelings, and the idea of laying out the last five years for yet another human being makes him want to be sick, frankly, but he is going to make this work.

He has no other choice.

Comments

[professionalcuriosity]

As the clock ticks over to the hour, Alana sets aside her notes from her last patient, grabbing a fresh clipboard before she heads to the door. "John?" she asks, offering the man a gentle smile. "I'm Dr. Bloom. Please, come on in and we'll get started."

[nervesofsteel]

John glances up from the magazine with the guilty look of a child caught riffling through his parents' things. He glances at his watch, and for half a second thinks about making some excuse and getting the hell out of there. He might have, too, except that Mary would surely ask him about it, and Mary's disappointment is worse than even the gross embarrassment of spilling his guts to a stranger.

"Right." He manages what he hopes is a casual smile as he pushes himself out of his chair. "Okay. Thanks."

[professionalcuriosity]

Alana stands in the doorway, leaving him room to enter first and pick somewhere to sit. She prefers to allow her clients a choice so they can be at their most comfortable — as comfortable, at least, as anyone can be, sitting in front of a stranger while explaining all the reasons they need help. It's a vulnerable position to be in. The least she can do is let them make the seating arrangements.

"This week," she says, "we'll just be going over why you're here, what's bothering you, the goals you'd like to make. That kind of thing."

[nervesofsteel]

“Sure.” John stands just inside the doorway, shifting his weight from food to foot. The office is decidedly nondescript, vaguely calming, but not particularly memorable. He chooses a straight-backed armchair, but even sitting, he resembles a coiled spring that might leap up at any moment.

A rather uncomfortable coiled spring.

He scrubs a hand through his hair and clears his throat. “Just- ah, just so you know, there’s nothing particularly wrong right now. I’m actually doing okay. But I was seeing someone before I ended up here, and I thought it might be good to check in or something."

[professionalcuriosity]

Alana eases down onto the couch opposite him, one leg crossing over the other. "Alright," she says. "That's good to hear. We'll try to keep it that way." She smiles. It's not all that uncommon either. The question is often whether it's necessary, a matter of comfort, or a cover up for the fact that something is still wrong. Whatever the reason, though, it can't hurt.

"Why were you going before?"

[nervesofsteel]

John smiles - or perhaps it’s a grimace. Either way, there is little real humor in his expression. “I was in the army. Royal Army Medical Corps. Spent three years in Afghanistan.” He pauses, searching her expression for recognition. This is Darrow; she could come from anywhere. If he has to explain Al Qaeda, and 9/11, and the whole fucked up world political scene, he thinks he might just lose his nerve and walk out then and there.

But he sees something that makes him think - hope - that she knows what he’s talking about, and he continues in a clipped sort of way, his gaze settling at a middle distance. “I got shot, and I came home, and I… didn’t really take it very well.” Post-traumatic stress disorder: these are words John Watson has never been able to say. “And for a long time, I was a really shitty therapy patient.” He snorts, and he looks at her for a second, and this time he does smile, if in a self-deprecating sort of way.

“But then…” And this is the difficult part. This will always be the difficult part. Even now, knowing that Sherlock, first-rate psychotic bastard, is alive and well, John has trouble forming the words without hearing Sherlock’s voice in his head. That’s what people do, isn’t it? Leave a note.

“About two years ago I saw my best friend die, and I knew I couldn’t do this alone again."

[professionalcuriosity]

It's a simple explanation of an awful, sad history, one that's not exactly uncommon and all the more unfortunate for it. John doesn't pity himself, though, just stays the course of explaining, right to the point. Alana suspects he's still more than capable of being a difficult patient, that he'll need coaxing now and then, and that, more often, he'll need to be left alone until he's ready.

"I'm sorry for your loss," she says. He doesn't need her to sit and be overly sympathetic. She doesn't know him yet, doesn't know what he's lost or what he considers a loss. But the death of any friend is an awful, difficult thing, never mind having to see it occur. "What happened to your friend? If you don't mind my asking."

[nervesofsteel]

“Right. Well. This is where it gets interesting.” John’s voice just about breaks at the end, and he has to clear his throat a few times before he trusts it again. Christ, he’s bad at this. At least Ella had known what had happened, that day he had shown up at her office, dripping wet and still in a daze, having walked there barely noticing the rain. She had made him say it anyway - her job had often been to convince him to say aloud things they both knew - but he had known that she had seen the reports, the papers. Something to give Sherlock’s death context.

“He threw himself off the roof of St. Bartholomew’s Medical Hospital.” John has gone back to not-quite looking at Alana. “Someone made him jump. A man- a man who had killed a lot of people, who couldn’t be stopped unless the world thought Sherlock was dead.”

Unless the world thought he was dead. His throat closes in anger. Why does Sherlock’s existence still feel like a gaping wound, even knowing he is alive? Why is the story of his resurrection even harder to tell than that of his death?

[professionalcuriosity]

"Thought," Alana echoes. That's obviously a key term. It does nothing to diminish the grief John must have felt, seeing his friend jump, if that friend is somehow still alive. The question is whether he is, or if that hesitation comes from denial. Either way, he's right about one thing: this just got interesting. A serial killer — or perhaps mass murderer — brings the world inside her office closer to the one she was living in as a consultant.

"So jumping was some kind of a trick or illusion?" Not impossible to do, she thinks, but it seems incredibly difficult to pull off and survive.

[nervesofsteel]

John can just manage a nod, his lips pressed into a thin line. “I found out just before I ended up in the city. The day before.” He clears his throat. “After two years without a bloody word."

[professionalcuriosity]

"That's... quite a shock," Alana says, in a tone which suggests she's fully aware that's a rather intense understatement. She can only imagine the sense of betrayal she would feel in a similar situation, of hurt and confusion and lingering grief despite the facts before her. The timing, she suspects, compounds matters.

"Did he explain why?"

[nervesofsteel]

“Mm.” John snorts. “I punched him a few times. Felt bloody good, actually.” He half-expects her to say something about unhealthy violent outbursts, and never mind that anyone who has met Sherlock would agree that he deserved to be punched in the face once in a while. “It had to do with Moriarty, the man who made him jump. Moriarty was dead, too, but Sherlock had to dismantle his whole criminal network, and to do that, they had to believe he was dead. That, and he’s a first-class bastard with little to no people skills." He grins dryly.

[professionalcuriosity]

"You sound close," Alana says, no trace of irony in her voice. The way John speaks of Sherlock, she's heard more than a few speak of their loved ones with that kind of bluntness. In most cases, she's found it indicates intimacy more than anything else.

She's more caught on the names mentioned. Watson. Moriarty. Sherlock. She was more interested in Southern Gothic than old English literature, growing up, but that hasn't kept her from being familiar with the famous detective and the Napoleon of crime. In a city where the strangest things happen, the simplest explanation may in fact be that all of this is true. After all, she has a client who survived a zombie apocalypse. On the other hand, at home, she would suspect delusions clung to by a man who needs meaning in his life and finds it in the coincidence of having the same name as a noted literary figure. Without Sherlock himself or someone else to corroborate what's being said, it's going to take tactful probing to be sure of the truth.

"So in order to make his death look convincing, even you had to be kept in the dark."

[nervesofsteel]

“Well, he decided he needed to keep me in the dark. His brother knew.” John remembers what Mary had said when Sherlock had revealed that little tidbit, and he almost laughs. He would have needed a confidante. Leave it to Mary to see the practicality. John loves her for it, even if he can’t forgive Sherlock for making the decision to confide in Mycroft, but not him. Not his best friend.

John shakes his head, almost a sort of shudder. “This all sounds crazy, doesn’t it?"

[professionalcuriosity]

"It sounds extreme," Alana corrects. If there's any madness here, it's on the part of his friend, presuming all of this is real. Which, until she has reason to do otherwise, is exactly what she'll do. "It also sounds like he wasn't really taking you into account when this happened."

[nervesofsteel]

Despite himself, John cracks a smile, and then he’s laughing - giggling, really. She’ll definitely think he’s crazy now, but he can’t help it. Understatement of the fucking year. “Yeah, um. Yeah, you could say that. He doesn’t really,” another huff of laughter, and then he clears his throat, trying to regain some modicum of composure. “He doesn’t really take people into account, generally. Friends are sort of a new thing for him."

[professionalcuriosity]

Alana smiles, amused. It's good to see John has a sense of humor about that, at least, even if she suspects it's somewhat morbid as well, all things considered. Better that than to expect this friend, Sherlock, to become something John can see he isn't.

"So he had a couple of years to take care of business," she says, "while you... what? What were you doing after that?"

[nervesofsteel]

“Getting on with things, I guess.” This bit is easier to tell, oddly enough. This is the bit where he got okay again, where Mary made him okay. “I met someone.” John smiles with a flash of sheepishness. “We’re married now, actually. She’s in Darrow, too, and we have a daughter.” He shrugs like it’s nothing, like Mary and Evie aren’t the only people keeping him afloat some days, like having a family doesn’t terrify him. “I mean, it was hell for a little while. You lose someone like that...” He blinks a few times, takes a breath. “But you get on with things."

[professionalcuriosity]

Alana nods. "You keep moving forward," she agrees, "or you sink." Already she can see that John is not a man who sinks. Even when no one would blame him for falling back a little, she suspects he doesn't allow it. It's something to watch out for in future sessions.

"How old is your daughter?"

[nervesofsteel]

“Three weeks.” John looks away, his expression softening as he speaks of his daughter. “She was born here. I guess that makes her an actual native, unlike the rest of us."

[professionalcuriosity]

It's a strange thought, someone growing up here knowing it as her entire world when her parents know something else to be true. Alana wonders how that will turn out, what effect it will have on the girl. "Congratulations," she says. "That must be quite a change."

[nervesofsteel]

“That’s what parenthood is supposed to be, right?” John doesn’t tell her how sudden it all was, that Mary showed up in Darrow pregnant, and with a year of experiences she hasn’t been quite honest with him about. He doesn’t admit that he has no wedding ring and no memory of a ceremony because for him, it never happened. Through no fault of her own, Evie’s very existence is tied up in everything John doesn’t know, everything he hasn’t experienced.

“It’s a lot,” is all he admits instead, with a shrug and a smile.

[professionalcuriosity]

"Especially on top of settling in here and the aftermath of Sherlock's return," Alana says. She has the sense there's something more to be said that he's not quite getting to — the birth of a child is a lot to sum up in so few words — but she can't quite tell if he's weighing telling her or planning not to. "Is she your first?"

[nervesofsteel]

"Yeah." Even as unsure about parenthood as he is, John can't about Evie for long without some part of him giving in to the wonder of her very existence. "Evelyn. She was sort of a surprise," he huffs a laugh, "but a good one. Mostly. I think."

He grins a bit to show he's joking. Mostly. He thinks.

[professionalcuriosity]

Alana laughs softly. "You weren't planning on having kids?" she asks. Truthfully, she's not sure she'd want to have children here. The place has a tendency to be troubled, and she'd find it odd, raising someone here when she knows she's from another world, though if anyone would accept that explanation without hesitation, it's a child. But then, she's unlikely to be in a position to have children until it's past being a sensible option.

[nervesofsteel]

“Maybe? Yeah, probably. Sooner or later.” Before Mary, John had usually thought about having kids with a certain amount of terror. He had wanted them - he had wanted them awfully, if he were being entirely honest - but had been terrified of the mess he would surely make of it. The reality is somehow both more and less terrifying than he ever imagined. “We just didn’t expect one quite so soon.”

[professionalcuriosity]

"At least it was a welcome surprise," Alana says. John seems so far like he'd be a good father. Some people who get surprised just aren't meant for it. "So you and your wife didn't meet here, I take it."

[nervesofsteel]

Johns nods. “Yeah. We met not long after- well, after Sherlock did his little disappearing act. She, ah, helped with a lot of things.” Embarrassed, he looks away, knowing he can’t hide everything that chance meeting has meant to him since.

[professionalcuriosity]

Alana smiles, quietly amused by the way he looks away. It's really very sweet. "Having a support system can make all the difference," she says. "They can help you stay grounded in the present and looking forward. It sounds like she's good support for you."

[nervesofsteel]

“Mary’s a fucking rock.” John can feel himself blush, but if there’s one thing he knows for sure, it’s that he wouldn’t still be in one living, breathing piece if it weren’t for Mary Morstan Watson. He might be bad at admitting the depth of his feelings, but he can’t deny what he owes her. “God knows why she puts up with me.” He tosses it off like false modesty, like English self-deprecation, but deep down John wonders what karmic good deed brought her to him and made her stay.

[professionalcuriosity]

"Love, I'd assume," Alana says, her smile briefly playful. "Or child support, who knows. I'm glad to hear you've got someone like her." It's clearly not a matter of convenience. However he plays it, he dotes on his wife, which is heartening. A supportive spouse is always a relief to her. Too many people have difficulty understanding, and it can inhibit progress, but it sounds like that won't be the case here.

[nervesofsteel]

John chuckles. “Yeah, something like that. But that- yeah, you’re right. That bit’s good. That bit has always been good.” Even now, when both of them are like the walking dead they’re so tired. Even when John is increasingly sure that Mary is hiding something from him. He and Mary have always been good. That’s his one constant, and he’ll never stop being grateful for it.

[professionalcuriosity]

"And you knew that very quickly," Alana says. "You met her not long after Sherlock's stunt, you said?" Not that she thinks one has anything to do with the other. If anything, that he could see her through his grief seems like proof something there is right.

[nervesofsteel]

“About a month later.” The corner of his mouth turned up, though no one would have called it a smile. “I wasn’t at my best. But…”

But somehow, that hadn’t mattered to Mary. Not one bit.

[professionalcuriosity]

Alana smiles, though it doesn't quite sit right on her face. She wants to say that doesn't matter, that love isn't contingent on perfect mental health. She believes it and she believes that a support system is not a solution at the same time, but she can't help thinking of Will.

"You mentioned you were in the Medical Corps. Do you work as a doctor here in Darrow?"

[nervesofsteel]

For a moment, John thinks that Dr. Bloom might be about to say something more, and he tenses slightly for the question. But the one that comes is innocuous enough. “Yeah. You know the outpatient clinic next to the hospital? I’m a GP on staff."

[professionalcuriosity]

"Oh, yeah," Alana says, nodding, "I know the place. That's good. And Mary's home with Evelyn?" She doesn't want to assume, of course, but it seems like the simplest way to handle things for them. Around here, though, she thinks it helps to have a job, something to do and a way to acclimate to life in Darrow.

[nervesofsteel]

“Yeah. I mean, for now. She’s a nurse, but she was seven months pregnant when she got here, so she hasn’t really had the chance…” John shrugs. It’s not something they’ve ever talked about, but he can’t imagine Mary staying home permanently. They’re not those sorts of people.

[professionalcuriosity]

Alana nods. "When Evelyn's older," she says. "It's a lot harder when they're so young to juggle it all." At least, that's what she understands from the experiences of people around her. Children just haven't been in the cards for her. She's still young enough for a family, but she doubts it'll happen. What she hasn't worked out yet is how she feels about that. "Is that how you met? Through work?"

[nervesofsteel]

“Have you got kids?” Okay, maybe he isn’t supposed to ask a therapist about her personal life. But Dr. Bloom is surprisingly easy to talk to for a shrink, and the question just slips out. “Yeah, you’d think that, wouldn’t you. But no. We’ve got a better story, actually. She helped me jump a turnstile on the Tube. Which is ridiculous. I know."

[professionalcuriosity]

"No, that's sweet," Alana says, meaning it entirely. Well, sweet may not be the exact word to use, but she likes it. It's something that makes for a different and interesting story, a quick way to get to know each other. "Not ridiculous at all. And no. No, I don't."

She very rarely offers up details of her personal life, but, for the most part, there's no harm in answering when asked. Her life isn't the point, but it's not entirely off-limits. "Maybe one day."

[nervesofsteel]

“Oh, it was pretty ridiculous,” John chuckles. “Well, ridiculous in the good way. She demanded I buy her a drink to repay her.” Even now, he looks back at that weird, chance moment as the most important in his life. Thank God he’d used up his Oyster card.

He’s a bit surprised by the news that Dr. Bloom doesn’t have kids. Maybe it’s an unfair assumption, but she seems like the type. But life often takes a person in unexpected directions; he knows that better than anyone.

[professionalcuriosity]

Alana smiles. It's the good ridiculous, he's right, absolutely charming in its absurdity. It makes her wistful, but she's practiced at hiding that. She's come to terms with the fact that dating just isn't right for her yet and that, even if it were, she hasn't found the right person for it. Her time will come or it won't; her life won't be any less rich for that.

"It sounds like now you're both even."

[nervesofsteel]

“Oh, no. She’s still got one up on me. She always will.” John grins, ducking his head as he leans his elbows on his knees. That’s true in more ways than he’s comfortable with these days, but for now he focuses on the good bits, the breathless joy of forever being one step behind her sallies, and jokes, and cleverness, forever trying to catch up, grateful just for the chance to run this race with her.