darling, the gloves are off.

glower:

ihavebeensherlocked:

ihavebeensherlocked:

“Remember that you were loved by me and that you made my life a happy one. And there’s no tragedy in that.”

These are the words Sherlock leaves with John.

Molly delivers the note to him, late in the evening after the hospital has released him and he’s begged Lestrade to leave him in peace (and he pretends he doesn’t hear him whispering fervently to Mrs. Hudson to please be careful, to search the flat and make sure John doesn’t act reckless and John allows Mrs. Hudson, who is also pale and shaking with the weight of their loss, to stay with him even if they only perch on the couch, silently sipping tea in each others company long past her usual bed time). John is absently cleaning out the tea pot when Molly Hooper’s mousy brown hair peeks around the corner of the kitchen. She makes muttered apologies about the door being unlocked (and that’s all she apologizes for, offers no sympathy or condolences for his friend and John should find that odd, he really should, but the fog in his head—a fog that might be from his concussion or might be from the shock and grief that will certainly overwhelm him before long—mutes these thoughts, addles them and makes his reasoning unclear). Her large eyes sweep across his face and there is so much worry in her features that John can barely stand to look at her right now. He doesn’t offer her tea, instead he waves the pot a bit, distractedly, as if to say ‘sorry, pot’s full of soap right now and I can’t use the other one because that one is Sherlock’s and he never cleaned it out after the last time he used it and it’s still full of his dregs’ and as he thinks about this his heart aches and his head spins and Molly awkwardly pats his arm and he sets the pot back down in the sink.

They stand in the kitchen together, surrounded by Sherlock’s equipment, experiments and dirty dishes and John wants to collapse against the small girl in front of him (so so so exhausted) but instead he forces a questioning grin at her as he wipes his sudsy hands on the front of his jeans. She hands him a slip of torn paper and looks away when he takes it.

The note is wrinkled from being torn hastily and John recognizes instantly that it’s come from the small Moleskine Sherlock carries (carried) on him (always in the inside pocket of that damn coat, carried right over his heart and the one time Sherlock handed the notebook to John to take down his rapidfire notes, the cover had been warm and John’s heart had stuttered as he stroked the smooth leather casing).

“Remember that you were loved by me and that you made my life a happy one. And there’s no tragedy in that.”

The writing is tiny, cramped, and written in a shaking hand and John doesn’t need skills as fine as Sherlock’s (were) to read the desperateness in those scrawled lines.

 Molly is shifting uneasily from foot to foot and then John sees the blood. There, just on the bottom corner of the paper is a half smudged fingerprint, terrible and dark and rust colored. A wave of nausea hits him and his face must have gone funny because Molly takes a tentative step forward, brings a hand to his arm and inhales sharply when she looks down at the note.

“I… I was still at Bart’s when they…” she swallows, and her fingers tighten on John’s forearm,”They asked me to perform the post-mortem. For him. I must have…” 

Molly is bringing her other hand up, reaching for the note and John yanks it away, carelessly stuffing it in his pocket.

He reassures her that it’s fine (it’s fine it’s fine it’s all fine) as he escorts her to the door, remembers himself and thanks her for bringing him the note (but he hates it, that fingerprint now burned into his retinas and he can see it every time he blinks and if Molly doesn’t leave, if he doesn’t sit down he’s going to be sick on her shoes) and to his own surprise leans forward and pecks her cheek briefly (just in front of the door, two feet from where Sherlock kissed her in the exact same way and does Molly even realize). She leaves and John slumps to the ground with his back to the door and he brings the note out of his pocket again. He tries to smooth away the wrinkles, carefully at first, then more desperately, his fingers fumbling with the paper and he shakes his head when the first tear splashes on the paper, just above Sherlock’s other last words.

“Remember that you were loved by me and that you made my life a happy one. And there’s no tragedy in that.”

And he’s terrified now because what if he smudges the pencil, what if he ruins the (incredibly precious) last thing his best friend ever did for him and he’s worried that the tea he had with Mrs. Hudson really won’t be staying down and his tears are falling in earnest now so he brings the note to his chest and presses it there, away from his face, away from the danger of being cried on and I feel like such a ponce he thinks but god dammit Sherlock what do you mean there is no tragedy in that?

It hurt, it was the worst hurt John had ever known, worse than earlier when Lestrade came to verify Sherlock’s death in the hospital. Worse than waking up in a different hospital years ago and being told by a frantic medic that he’d been shot. 

And he’d known dammit that Sherlock had loved him, knew it without needing a fucking note, knew it each time they looked at each other at a crime scene and smiled, and when Sherlock played one of John’s favorite songs on his violin and I know I never told him which ones I liked but Sherlock always knew that about me and even if I never told him…. never told him that….

And John choked and prayed that Sherlock knew that he was loved. And he had made John’s life an amazing one. A better one.

“Remember that you were loved by me and that you made my life a happy one. And there’s no tragedy in that.”

[Quote from Third Star. I’m sorry.]

(via capes)

ginaraf:

That Day (Charles, PG-ish)

I can’t get this movie out of my head.  It’s like on constant repeat in my brain.  it doesn’t help that I eating up all the fics I can find.  I want to read ALL the AU fics where Charles and Erik live happily ever after. 

(via deliciouslycheesy)

clear-liqueur:

turtletotem:

Charles felt it was safe to assume that the German village, clean and cozy-looking under a veil of snow, was from Erik’s subconscious. The tree they stood beneath, a study in stark black and white, was identical to the one outside Charles’s study window. The paper lanterns — those he couldn’t vouch for.

“Are these yours?” he asked, turning his face up to the buttery lights. “They’re lovely.”

“Why do you keep doing this, Charles?” Erik’s voice was tired, pained.

“I’m not doing a thing, my friend, as I’ve told you before,” Charles said with a half-smile. “This place is a creation of your mind as much as mine. Some part of you wants to be here, or it wouldn’t exist.”

The very first time, weeks ago now, had been Cuba; Charles had dozed off in his own bedroom and ‘woken’ there, back in Erik’s arms on the beach. With tears choking his voice, Erik had begged Charles’s forgiveness, cursed him for a fool and a traitor, and cursed himself for leaving him, all in the same breath. It had been quite a shock to both of them to realize the other was real, that this was neither Erik’s dream nor Charles’s, but somehow both. Even now, Charles knew, Erik didn’t quite believe him. There were moments he didn’t believe it himself, however much his telepathy insisted another mind was present before him.

Since that first night there had been a park bench drifted with brilliant autumn leaves; the deck of a Coast Guard cutter, gray shock blankets around their shoulders; an apple orchard from Charles’s childhood, picnic blanket spread with an assortment of weapons he’d never seen… Sometimes they talked for hours about trivial things — music, architecture, linguistics — sometimes they didn’t talk at all, just walked side by side through their joined minds, surveying the landscape. Usually, like tonight, the atmosphere of the dream was just surreal enough to make any talk of their separation, of their deepest differences, seem unnecessary and out of place.

“I admit,” Charles said now, turning away from the tree to look out across a frozen lake, “I can only assume my ability is constructing this… this link, whatever it is that allows us to do this. But it’s not working alone.” He adjusted the scarf around his neck, trying to keep the chill breeze from slicing down his collar; how curious that the temperature here so nearly reflected the true season, when their subconsciouses could surely have made it warmer if they wished.

“I do like to see you,” Erik murmured behind him. “To see you safe and well. Even if it’s just a dream.”

Safe and well. Charles had not yet had the nerve, or the heart, to tell Erik that as they stood here, Charles’s body was slumped over a desk in the study, legs numb and immobile in their chair.

“Just a dream? Come now, Erik,” he said instead, “a moment ago you were accusing me of dragging you here; now you imply that I’m not even really here myself? You can’t have it both ways, you know.” Recklessly, emboldened by the surreality of the dream, the forgiving glow of the lanterns, he stepped closer to Erik, holding his gaze. “You can’t have me here and not here at the same time.”

“I can’t have you at all.” His voice was quiet, lost, his eyes briefly full of — something — before he turned roughly away, looking out over the snowy village.

Charles stared after him, suddenly very aware of his own heartbeat. He had hoped for so long — spent so many hours next to Erik in cars, across from him at chess boards, mere feet away in hotel rooms, wondering if he dared, wondering if Erik could ever — and then had come the beach, and all hope was lost.

Wasn’t it?

He took a step toward Erik, brushing past a lantern — and was arrested by the realization that the flickering light within them was not fire. He peered closer, steadying it with his hand.

Images moved within the red-gold light. More than images, sensory impressions — sounds, smells, textures — that crept into Charles’s mind as he looked. Memories, unmistakably Erik’s. In this lantern, memories of the two of them in the back of Darwin’s cab. Charles had never dreamed Erik was so aware of Charles’s arm along the back of the seat, barely touching his neck, or the brush of their legs together off and on through the hours — had not even remembered dozing off against Erik’s shoulder partway through the drive, Erik slipping an arm around him to hold him in place.

In each lantern a memory — a touch, a glance, the line of Charles’s throat as he sipped brandy at the chessboard, the brush of Charles’s mind against his own —

“There’s so much more to you than pain and anger. There’s good, too, I’ve felt it.”

“You’re not alone. Erik, you’re not alone.”

And in some lanterns not memories at all but dreams, silent hopes only half-admitted — Charles’s warmth against him as the sun rose outside the bedroom window — blue eyes dilated with need and fixed on Erik’s as —

Charles tore himself away from that one, breathing deeply, locking his knees to stop their trembling.

“You shouldn’t be here, Charles,” Erik said, voice tight with humiliation disguised as anger.

“Yes I should,” Charles breathed. “I should be anywhere that you are, my friend, and vice versa.” 

He put a hand on Erik’s shoulder, and Erik turned around, his face a study in uncertainty and fragile hope.

“This isn’t real,” he whispered as Charles slid his hands gently up the lapels of his coat, the sides of his face.

“It’s as real as you want it to be,” Charles said, and pulled him down to press their lips together.

The kiss was slow and gentle for perhaps five seconds. Then Erik’s arms wrapped tight around him, pulling him in by the waist, one hand tangling in his hair. Charles rose on his toes, wanting more, harder, tighter, returning the embrace with everything he had, and of course this was real, more real than any other kiss he’d ever had, warmer, sweeter, richer, better…

And he knew already that this might be all they ever had, these stolen sleeping moments, these meetings of the mind. He would take what he could get. He would kiss and be kissed in the lantern-light, and pray to never wake.

TEARS.

(via clearliqueur)