atlinmerrick

Don't ask John Watson how he and Sherlock Holmes first got romantically involved. Just don't.

Because everyone asks him, no one asks Sherlock, and frankly it's become annoying. Partially because he doesn't quite know how to answer honestly except in the vaguest terms: "It just happened. Over time. Somehow."

And partially it's because they always ask him and no on asks Sherlock and for once he'd like to be the one listening to the story instead of being the one telling it. Yet if John dares say, "Ask him how it started, he'll tell you everything, including the barometric pressure and the price of petrol that day," he knows exactly what will happen.

That person, if they don't really know Sherlock well, will actually do it. They'll turn to the detective with a winsome smile and they'll actually ask: "So, how did you two get together anyway?"

And it will take no less than eighteen seconds, no more than twenty-two, for a shocked flush to creep up the asker's collarbones. It'll take twenty-three to thirty seconds before they realize yes, he did just say the words hard on, masturbation, and anal sex, and it will be no more than forty seconds before that person flees the room, forgetting their gloves but fortunately remembering their coat. (John never had the courage to bring the gloves round the next day.)

So don't ask John how they got together because he's just tired of the question and for god's sake don't ask Sherlock. If you're really curious and have a strong constitution why don't you just take a few minutes and read this? It'll be faster, you can go at your own pace, and you'll have time to draw the curtains, too. Because consider this fair warning: This story contains the words hard-on, masturbation, anal sex, erection, come, fuck, well-hung, "do me", boner, and Frankenstein. Still reading? Lovely. Grab a cup of tea and take a seat, the worst is over and the best is yet to come. So to speak.

So. John and Sherlock. Sherlock and John. Getting together. Romantically. How? Well, essentially it was Gary Glitter's fault, and you can take that to the bank.

Not that Sherlock Holmes knew who Glitter was mind you. He'd never heard the phrase glam rock, or until that October night listened to a single one of the artist's songs.

That all changed when he headed home three days early from an investigation in Glasgow. Yes, he tried texting John from the airport to let him know, yes he thought about buying a quarter hour of internet access and sending an email, but his mobile was dead and then the plane was boarding and it really didn't seem that important. After all, he'd be home within hours.

And he was. Home: Where he could have a cup of tea and tell John about the case. Home: Where he could bug Lestrade for another case, while crowing about the one he'd just closed. Home—where a thrumming bass beat reverberated through the old floors like a damned disco?

Sherlock stood in the downstairs foyer of 221B Baker Street for five long seconds, briefly confused. And then he lunged up the stairs three at a time, having erroneously deduced (and on such flimsy evidence) that in his absence John had packed up and left, subletting the flat to a brace of drunken uni students.

When he wrenched open the flat's door, he was quite nearly physically assaulted by back beat. Hands flying to his ears, the detective waded into the ungodly sound, gaze sweeping the sitting room top to bottom. But there were no bongs, kegs, teetering stacks of text books, no burning incense. Instead there was the skull (thank you Mrs. Hudson), a teetering stack of unpaid bills, a Union Jack pillow, a familiar mess—in short, blessed normality.

Except for that brain bending noise.

Sherlock spun around, simultaneously drawn to and repelled by the cacophony, until he rounded the corner to the kitchen, and found there his understated flatmate, his mild-mannered friend, his mellow, mellow colleague…well it can only be called grooving to Gary Glitter's "Rock and Roll Part 2." All alone. There. In the kitchen. Eyes closed. Barely dressed. Barely dressed in two things: Sherlock's purple silk shirt, and Sherlock's gray wool scarf.

And standing there, watching the smaller man move, it would be quite right to say it seemed as if John was not in the room. He was, possibly, not even in London. He was somewhere else entirely and he liked it there, liked it so much that he was grinning like a fool and more than half hard.

Unnoticed, unheeded, the consulting detective reflexively took in each detail of what he saw, just as he always did, but his response to what he saw? Well, that was quite unique. Because for the first time in nearly twenty years, instead of recording, absorbing, and deducing, the brain and body of Sherlock Holmes lit up like a god damn supernova, washed in a cold fire of sexual need.

Knees half buckling, Sherlock tripped away from the kitchen doorway, fell back against the sitting room wall, and breathed in ragged clumps.

Fortunately it took him only three seconds (yes he counted, because sometimes when he can't think around his own thinking, Sherlock reflexively counts how long it takes him to get back on track) to realize he had to move, hide, get out. Why he had to do any of those things he couldn't have said at that moment, but he let instinct move his feet for him, lock the flat door for him, and that's how he found himself on the other side of the door of 221B having a panic attack in the hallway.

It was Sherlock's first panic attack in twenty-two years, actually, and it was a doozy. Unlike the cluster of freak-outs he'd had at twelve—I want them to like me; I don't care if they like me; they're idiots; I'm an idiot—this panic attack was three-dimensional, a little twitchy, and it ached.

Let's face it, Sherlock wasn't twelve anymore, he was thirty-four years old and quite set in his ways. To have any sexual response to external stimuli was unacceptable. To have a knee-weakening sexual response to a flatmate was madness. To have a painful erection right now, this minute, in response to looking at John and his erection (when Sherlock hasn't had so much as a wet dream in over two years), well that was impossible.

Except, of course, it wasn't. Except, well maybe he was imagining things. It took more than logic and brilliance to piece together clues and solve a case; you had to have a vigorous imagination, too. So maybe he was…just…overthinking and…well he should check, gather data, make sure.

With a deeply drawn breath, there in the hallway, leaning against his own front door (the music thrumming through the wood), Sherlock lifted his chin, bit his lip, and surreptitiously Brailled a few tentative fingers over his groin.

Lord god was he hard. As hard as…his mind flailed, reaching. As hard as the skull, that's how hard. (Three months later, bored at a crime scene, Sherlock would laugh out loud and inappropriately when he remembers that he'd compared his first boner in years to, well, a bone.)

Okay, the facts were in and they were alarming and now Sherlock's response was to get so panicky he couldn't breathe.

Which is exactly what happens when you're ruthless with your hard drive. Keep the platter too clean and you really, really don't have the information you need when you need it. Like information for "What should I do if I'm suddenly wildly turned on by my flatmate?" or data for "He was wearing my clothes. My clothes. Oh my god is he turned on by me?"

Queue a whole new set of emotions as Sherlock "I'm a genius and you're an idiot" Holmes realizes that he not only failed to realize his own attraction to John, but missed every sign of John's attraction to him.

Thank god for empty hallways because there was probably no safer place in all of London for Sherlock to have his first and only nervous breakdown in peace.

"I am not having a nervous breakdown," he said, his voice deep with annoyance.

And just like that, with nothing more profound than hearing his own voice, his own irked voice, Sherlock found a small sliver of normality. Such a shame it was promptly yanked out from under him when John Watson opened the flat's door.

"What the hell—"

Sherlock crossed his legs at the ankle and casually pulled his long coat closed over him, as if he often stretched out on the floor. "Hello John."

"Sherlock, what—"

But the detective was already springing up, grabbing his bag, and rushing past his flatmate—whom he was extremely careful not to touch—tossing random lies and obfuscations behind him as he went.

"Terrible flight, wretched case, I've got to type up some notes, care to go for dinner later, I'll be in my room for a few hours."

At least that last part was true, for Sherlock did indeed spend the next two and a half hours in his bedroom, sitting on the edge of his bed doing three things:

* Periodically wondering if it would make things better or worse if he touched it.

* Trying very hard not to think about touching it.

* Working extremely hard to not think about why it wanted to be touched.

In the end he didn't touch it because he'd gone so long ignoring it that he was pretty sure if he paid it any attention he'd botch the whole process anyway. Still, even when the erection finally went away he stayed there, thinking. And getting nowhere. Because deep and throbbing sexual attraction as an adult? This was new territory for Sherlock. It was the Wild West, Terra Incognita, No Man's Land. He could think about it six ways from Sunday but without more data he had no clue how to proceed.

Fortunately Sherlock Holmes was very good at gathering, collating, interpreting, and finally making conclusions from data. As a matter of fact he was rather well-known for it.

Good. It was settled. Sherlock stood up, brushed his hands down the front of his pristine trousers, snatched his coat up off the chair, opened his door, and—

—ran right into John Watson.

It took a moment to untangle their bodies, and in that one precious moment the data collection began:

* John's hair is much softer than it looks (this dispatch was courtesy of Sherlock's cheek, which was briefly mashed up against John's head).

* My lips are at the perfect height to kiss his forehead (this communiqué was provided largely by that same cheek, but the lips agreed with the memo).

* John has a smell. Of course John has a smell. I just didn't know it was…nice (obviously this small note was offered by Sherlock's nose).

* He's so solid, compact, firm (this missive was offered by pretty much all the nerve endings at the front of Sherlock's body as they happily ran into a large part of the front of John).

And finally:

* I don't believe this, I don't believe this, I don't believe this. I'm getting hard again. Put on your coat Sherlock. Put it on now and say something rude.

"Really John, do you have to sneak around the house like a little mouse?" The detective breezed past his flatmate and said over his shoulder, "How does Angelo's sound?"

Sherlock didn't hear John's answer, too busy thinking about one final piece of data collected by his body:

* Either John was still half hard or good god was he well-hung.