Don’t Ask Me That

Possibly the best thing about living with the madman known as Sherlock, was his inability to ask questions. The man was so confident in his ability to deduce, especially simple people like his new flatmate, that if there was something that wasn’t immediately obvious to his ever processing brain he couldn’t let his ego be bruised by simply asking about it. It was something John almost felt guilty about exploiting, but then again fingers in his tea caddy, so he didn’t.

John had had friends and roommates, lovers and bunkmates who had figured out something was wrong before. He’d fielded their questions with a smile and a lie and life went on. They didn’t really want to know and he couldn’t bear to truly tell them. The quickest it had been noted was on base in Afghanistan. Quarters had been cramped and you got sleep where you could, it still took his friend four months to notice and say anything. John didn’t think it would take that long for Sherlock to notice.

It was six weeks after living with the eccentric man the John knew he knew something was up. John didn’t say anything though. At seven weeks he woke in the middle of the night to Sherlock watching him sleep. They met eyes for a few minutes then the tall man had left in a twirl of his bed-robe. At eight weeks Sherlock was particularly bored and spent an entire day following John and making notes about his movements, it was so disturbing John had locked himself in the bathroom only just avoiding Sherlock following him inside. He took a very long shower before braving the rest of the day with the lunatic.

It was the ninth week when Sherlock expressed some frustration and stole John’s iPod. John tried to mask how uneasy it made him. He needed his iPod. His iPod was filled with comforting sounds, things he knew inside and out, things that didn’t crowd him. He didn’t ask for it back. He went to the shops without it, and felt as though he were on patrol again, ears alert for anything that might be a threat. He didn’t jump at backfire, or a crate that slammed to the ground as it was being unloaded. The bell of the register did seem to ring and ring and ring though and he had to force his smile as he bid the cashier good day. He put away the groceries and went to bed, happily sliding in his earplugs. It was too early to sleep, he hadn’t had dinner but he’d had enough.

He went to work the next day slightly jittery. It didn’t matter when he was with someone, had something to focus on like Sherlock’s voice or the shuffle of his clothes as he walked but when he was on his own, when he had nothing but eternity around him, he needed the silence or the music. He went through a lot of patients and took to wearing his stethoscope while filling out paperwork in his office. He held it in his hand and reveled in the static and soft thump of his heart he got through his palm. He walked home; he didn’t think he could manage a bus with all its noise and nothing to focus on.

The two ate Chinese take-away, both wanting to ask a question but neither giving in. John retired early again wanting the comfort of his bed after his long day and longing for his earplugs. He let a yawn escape and excused himself. Once set for bed he pulled out the case for his plugs and was angry to find it empty. Part of him wanted to force the confrontation but he knew the question would be asked and he couldn’t tell Sherlock. He couldn’t lie well enough to fool him. The man would never accept “leave it be” as an option. John may have killed for Sherlock it doesn’t mean he has to give him everything, his loyalty, his trust that’s fine, but his secret that was his own. He climbed into bed and tried to sleep but his eyes snapped open at every tick of the clock, every shift of the sheets, every damned car that passed on Baker Street.

He turned off his alarm blearily ten minutes before it was supposed to scream its high pitched chime, and shuffled down to the kitchen to make a very strong cup of tea. He was unsurprised to see his flatmate perched on his chair fingers pressed into his chin. The steely eyes took in every nuance of the doctor. John took his tea and drank it while it was still scalding, unwilling to look at the man he was very annoyed with right now. John’s phone beeped and the text summoned him to the office to cover for an emergency; he quickly agreed needing the hours to pay his half of the rent. He was gone in twenty minutes never speaking a word to the consulting detective.

He knew at the end of his grueling shift around four that afternoon that he could not manage the bus. Taking the bus was a very, very bad idea, likely ending with him doing something very, very stupid. He also knew he couldn’t afford a taxi. Instead he had to walk again it was past six when he made it home. He stumbled up the stairs and flopped onto the couch in a daze not even noticing the detective watching him from the kitchen or his concerned face. John wanted to sleep. He wanted to fall into black oblivion and just stop for even a few minutes but he tossed at every noise.

It started softly. So softly John might not have noticed if he’d not been John, but at the first barely audible notes his attention focused solely on the vibrating strings even though his eyes remained shut. They grew in sound but remained calm and soft. It was one of his favorite pieces Pachelbel’s Canon in D; he sighed and fell sleeping soundly. He surfaced as the music stopped it was a different song; it had been at least three hours. He looked to Sherlock standing near the window back to him, violin still propped on his shoulder.

“Mi Mancherai” John acknowledged.

Sherlock let the violin fall to his side. “Double murder in Lambeth, not even a five but Lestrade insists.”

They were on the scene for all of six minutes, four of them arguing with Donovan, one dismissing an obstinate Anderson with Lestrade’s help and one looking over the bodies. Sherlock barely repressed his cry of boring and told Lestrade to look for the brother and left. They were home before midnight. John made tea and brought it through to the sitting room. Sherlock’s fingers were stroking the neck of his violin he stood ignoring his tea and started to play again, his face softened as he lost himself in the music.

John relaxed immediately and a smile crossed his face. The slow soft bitter sweet strains enveloped him, when they sped up and became so lively that he felt his fingers tapping against his warm mug. It ended sharply and he opened his eyes. Sherlock had turned and his eyes were focused intently on John taking in everything about the man. John just nodded, not really sure how to react.

The silence continued along with Sherlock’s expectant stare.

“Shenandoah,” He finally provided.

Sherlock merely nodded, put his violin away carefully and drank his now cooling tea.

John excused himself for bed. He may have had a nap but he was still tired, and he had promised to cover tomorrow mornings shift as well so Sarah could recover fully from her food poisoning. Sherlock must have slipped into his room while he’d made tea because on his pillow was his iPod and earplugs. He slipped the plugs in and released a tension in his chest that had been building.

John wondered what Sherlock had deduced because he didn’t act any differently. He assumed if the man had figured John’s secret he would have wanted to experiment. There was no experimenting though, and the intense observation had ceased. John wanted to know why there had been no change, but he didn’t want to invite that change either, so he continued on their friendship as though nothing had happened. His iPod didn’t go missing anymore and his earplugs went untouched.

It was months later that they were called onto a case that had Lestrade calling Sherlock who had then called on John. There had been a kidnapping and the ransom demand was left in snippets of songs on an old walkman. Sherlock had deleted most popular music and knew John listened to a wide variety having closely examined his ever present iPod very carefully. Sherlock started playing the tape and John was startled. There were snippets, five to ten seconds of each and then on to the next. It made John flinch at the abruptness of it all. The tape ended and Sherlock rewound it for John to listen to again. John walked away. He didn’t go far just outside of the worried family’s house, but the fact that he had left Sherlock behind had the long man following him with the tape player.

John acquired a pen and memo pad from Donovan with a polite smile. He leaned onto the hood of one of the police cars and started writing. Sherlock didn’t start the tape again he just watched. John handed him the list and pulled out his iPod and immersed himself in Vivaldi trying to scour the choppy mess that had been the tape from his mind. Sherlock looked as though he would say something but a glance at the list had his mind whirling and him running inside to yell at Lestrade.

The case wasn’t over so quickly though. It seemed as though the world was out to expose John, and he felt awful for feeling that way when a fourteen year old boy had been taken and was going through such a horrible ordeal, but he still felt it. Another tape was found at the location the first had informed them to make the drop at. John listened to it too, it was different. It wasn’t a bunch of snippets it was one piece, short, not a studio recording. It was a love song played on the piano. John swore. The kid was playing, the halting melody painted a rather vivid picture of a nervous player, hands shaking. A glance at Sherlock showed he knew this too, John didn’t say anything other than the title and they were running at Sherlock’s instruction.

There were three tapes this time. Each was played by a shaking hand. They had to guess the right one and it was the last clue. Sherlock deduced wrong.

“No.” John had said firmly catching his flatmates surprised eye. “The second one.”

Sherlock hadn’t asked any questions he had merely looked John in the eye and decided to trust him. Something must have told the man John was right, perhaps he had wavered between the second and third and the surety in John’s voice had swayed him. John didn’t know, and he didn’t care, because he knew he was right.

They found the boy. He was cold and frightened handcuffed to the leg of a rather battered baby grand in a music room at an abandoned school. He had to have his stomach pumped from the pills that had been forced down his throat but he would be fine. Lestrade’s men had caught the kidnappers leaving the building but the suitcase had gone missing from the second location. There was still a third party out there. Sherlock quickly set a plan and John was needed. They made their own tape with John’s knowledge of music and left it by the piano.

That night they were rewarded by a call from Lestrade the third was in custody, the boy was going to be fine and his parents had barely cared about getting the ransom back, a rather large donation had been made to Saint Bart’s in the name of ‘the amazing Doctor’, for finding him so quickly. Sherlock had sniffed at that. John may have had the useless knowledge but Sherlock had put it together. Lestrade had laughed at his snit and hung up. The silence was heavy with questions.

John waited for the detective to deduce him but the man just sat there. Finally it became too much for him and John broke the silence.

“Well?”

Sherlock looked up. “You don’t want me to know.”

John actually laughed at that. “It doesn’t mean you don’t think you should know.”

“No.” Sherlock admitted.

“So why aren’t you demanding answers? Why give me back my earplugs in the first place another night and I’d have told you everything.”

Sherlock shifted eyes darkening. “It hurt you.” He said simply

“What?”

“It hurt you.” Sherlock said again hating to repeat himself. “You don’t want me to know what it is; you don’t want me to know why you need to shut yourself off from sound. I tried to figure it out by taking away your tools and it hurt you. I don’t want to hurt you.”

John was touched. He knew the man was cruel at times, he also knew it was never intentional, just he simply didn’t see the world the same as most people. The fact that he had seen John suffering and stopped it meant he was looking, was making sure he didn’t hurt John. It meant Sherlock was trying for John.

“So why not just ask?” John finally sighed.

“You don’t want to tell me.” Sherlock huffed eyebrows tight in frustration.

“But you want to know.”

“Yes I want to bloody know.” Sherlock flung out his arms. “It makes no sense. You can sleep only with music or silence; you don’t like to be alone without one or the other. I thought it PTSD but it never presents as such. You’re entirely comfortable with both tools so it’s not a new development, if it were from your wound you would still forget to buy new earplugs or leave your iPod uncharged you never do so it’s a long established routine.”

“Since I was six.” John admitted.

Sherlock turned his sharp eyes to John. “You don’t want to tell me. So you shouldn’t.” He looked as though the words physically hurt him.

“What’s the first thing you ever said?” John asked Sherlock.

Sherlock didn’t question the change in subject. “Mycroft insists I was born saying ‘no.’ Mummy says it was mummy.”

“The first thing I said was ‘stop.’” John admits then takes a deep breath. “I was eight months old. Harry was banging on the floor with a metal spoon. It hurt my ears. Mum said stop and she did, she started again so I said stop. They thought I was gifted for a while, but then I would just shut down and cry silently for ages until they left me alone. I couldn’t explain what I didn’t know was wrong and they couldn’t figure it out. We went to specialists who spoke softly and suggested antipsychotics and antidepressants and all sorts. I was lucky I guess, Mum didn’t think that was the problem.

“They learned by the time I was four that soft music and quiet helped. I would play Vivaldi over and over and just relax. When I was five I went to school. It was horrible. So much noise I would run and hide in the library where it was quiet. They said I was disturbed and socially repressed, but the teacher said I was supposed to pay attention to her, so I did. It was a hard year. I couldn’t stand it if the teacher stepped out of the room because I had to focus on her or everything would spiral out of control.

“When I was six and changed classes to a more structured format it was an eye opener for everyone. I had a teacher who when someone was in trouble would often scold with ‘what did I just say.’ One day I thought it was a question so I told her. I told her exactly what she’d just said, word for word, for the last five minutes. She kept me inside during recess and had me repeat long lines of numbers and random words. She was fascinated. She had me recite the conversation from breakfast. She asked questions none of the specialists had even thought about. She called Mum that night and set up a meeting.”

“Eidetic memory?” Sherlock wondered out loud. “No, you couldn’t shut that out, something else?”

“Took the specialists 4 months to rule out eidetic memory,” John chuckled. “They had me sitting test after test after test. They seemed quite disappointed with me when I didn’t remember pictures like they wanted, told me they could work on that. I can remember the sickly sweet tones they used with Mum telling her to send me to a special school. I remember every word she threw at them about me being a child not a science experiment. She got me a radio and told me when I needed the words to stop it was my refuge. She managed to talk the school into allowing it, possibly threaten, she was a frightening woman.”

John didn’t know why he felt he needed to tell Sherlock everything; it was as though a dam had broken. Sherlock was willing not to know, SHERLOCK, and that was everything. Since anyone first figured something was not quite right with John they wanted to know, they wanted to scratch at the surface until the dug out the little gem that was John’s secret. Sherlock wanted everyone’s secrets, but he was willing to let John keep his. It felt right to tell him everything.

“From then on I had my music. It was a part of me as much as anything can be a part of you.” John shrugged. “Do you remember your first word Sherlock? I mean actually remember saying it?”

“No.” He admits. “I’m sure if I could of I would have deleted it, but I don’t recall ever having such early memories.”

“I remember it. I remember the way it resonated in my head, so different from the cries I had used before, it had meaning. There was a shocking understanding in that moment that I feel we strive for over and over again in our lives. I changed in that moment with that sound. I went from not knowing to understanding. It changed everything. I remember everything I hear Sherlock. Everything. I remember the Farsi screams after a suicide bomb. I remember every angry drunk word my sister’s ever yelled at me, I remember every sigh you huff when bored, and I remember everything that I hear when asleep too.”

“The earplugs.”

“You don’t want to know what it’s like to be unable to forget your sister discovering her lesbian tendencies.” John winced. “Or that you are why your father leaves in the middle of the night, that he can’t stand having a freak for a son, all he wanted was a normal family, a happy wife, a son and a daughter, not a bread winner, a freak, and a fag.”

Sherlock very tactfully remained silent.

“Alright you have questions.” John sat back desperate for more tea, his long since drained.

“Why do you take notes?”

“What?” Of all the things Sherlock could have asked that was not the one John was expecting.

“You remember all you hear, you normally just write down what I say. Why?” Sherlock was dead serious.

“Part defenses, partly habit, mostly because it makes Lestrade think I’m doing something.” John shrugged. “I might slip up and say something I shouldn’t remember so if asked I can just say I take very good notes and it will be an established pattern and believable.”

“How did you know it was the second recording and not the third?”

“The shaking was wrong in the playing. The first was just faking it, the third was shaking but it was in cold the hesitation wasn’t from nerves but chills, and the second the nerves make you pull up on the note faster and hesitate to press down at all. When you spend your life listening you can’t help but hear.”

“Fascinating.” Sherlock mumbled. “I assume hearing a noise again brings others like it to the front of your memory?”

John nodded. “Yes. Hearing a phone ring is like hearing a million phones ring all at once without a focus.”

“A focus?”

“My first teacher, she told me to focus on her so I did. I taught myself to ignore all the sounds but hers. So I heard her dress shifting, her footsteps, her voice, her chalk on the board, when I focused all that the other noises they became less important. I tried to focus on things, my own sounds but I couldn’t do it without another person it just never worked. The music took everything else away and let me float, the earplugs let me sleep, and people let me focus. We found something that worked and we perfected it.”

“So when you don’t have that? When I took them away?”

John winced. He didn’t want to tell Sherlock really. “It wasn’t as bad as it could have been. I never had to get on the bus or anywhere noisy like the tube. The shopping was a bit harrowing. Every conversation is mine to repeat now and they all happen at once crashing on top of one another demanding a stage. I cheated at the surgery. Used the stethoscope, made patients my focus, they expect it. I can’t do that to strangers, they take it the wrong way and that spells trouble.”

“And at night?” Sherlock pressed.

“Sometimes it’s still and quiet and it’s all a ruse because a noise always comes from it and it all comes crashing in on me until it’s overwhelming. Then sometimes it’s still and it just stays still and I expect the noise until I can’t stand it and remembered nights come creeping in and replay in my head until I don’t know if I’m awake or asleep and I have to find out one way or another. With the earplugs I know I can’t hear most noises, something very near or very loud yes but I probably want to hear those, so I can relax and just accept that what I hear is in my head and I’m probably sleeping.”

“Are you?” Sherlock was leaning so far forward John didn’t know how he was still in his chair.

“For the most part,” John admits. “Normally I go back to concerts I’ve been to and drift from there. Once I don’t have to question the dreams it becomes a lot easier to accept them.”

“Do you lucid dream?” Sherlock demanded.

John actually laughed. “Not one specialist ever asked that. I always had to tell them.”

Sherlock scoffed. “You’re specialists were idiots. It’s a logical conclusion.”

“I needed a way to check if I was asleep that wouldn’t hurt me if I was awake, so no jumping off of buildings to fly, so I created a focus in the dreams. When I would start wondering if I was awake I look around and if it’s there I’m asleep.”

Sherlock sat back and assumed his thinking pose. After it became apparent there were no further questions John left him to it and went to bed.

The next few days were strange in the fact that nothing changed. John grew comfortable and wondered if Sherlock simply didn’t care. It was a full ten days before Sherlock dropped a notebook filled with his scribbles into John’s lap. Looking over the first two pages he looked up at his flatmate with questioning eyes.

“Only if you want to.”

John flipped through the proposed experiments. Each was clearly laid out with the hypothesis and the possible benefits of each. Each had a specific goal, even John could tell it was a lead up to something bigger something never mentioned in the few pages he saw.

“What’s the goal?”

Sherlock smiled his special my-flatmate’s-not-as-boring-as-he-looks-and-is-fascinating smile, the one he saved for special occasions when John surprised him. “Your own version of a Mind Palace. Where you can lock up each sound and it won’t overwhelm you.”

John took a sharp breathe. It would be wonderful to let a sound go for once in his life.

“I can’t guarantee it would work.” Sherlock quickly added, not wanting to lie to his friend.

“But you think it would.” John stated as he closed the notebook. “I can stop it whenever I want?”

“Of course,” Sherlock inclined his head.

“That’s enough for me.” John admitted. “When do we start?”

He was excited. He never told anyone about his secret because it was a curse, because he couldn’t stop himself from being overwhelmed occasionally. Sherlock who he trusted more than anyone he’d ever known was offering him a cure.

Sherlock’s eyes practically shone with excitement. John was his friend and he was going to finally be able to repay him slightly for that honor. Sherlock was determined to be worthy of John, this project may just help him and if John managed his own Mind Palace they could share that too. Sherlock snatched the notebook from the doctor’s lap and dove straight in to explaining everything. The two worked well into the night and the cloud of anticipation over 221B Baker Street dispersed. The secret was exposed, the boil lanced and a cure was being brewed.

The absolute best thing about rooming with a madman John decided when he collapsed exhausted into his bed well into the morning, was that he had to know everything and didn’t believe in a problem with no solution.