trashchildren | For Joan

He doesn't know what else to say about it, so he just sits there, closing his eyes, drawing comfort from her. He's so grateful he doesn't have to go through this alone.

Slowly the pain starts to lessen, become less urgent, less sharp. He lets himself sit there for a while longer still, allowing himself some time to just be quiet and vulnerable and just... not worrying about being positive. He feels comfortable enough with her that he can just exist alongside her.

Finally he needs to pull back, his back achy from sitting all crooked.

"I think I'm gonna hit the shower," he says quietly. He needs a little bit of alone time and to feel a bit fresher before he talks to Henry.

"Okay," she murmurs. A shower is a good idea. Hot water can be soothing, and she knows he'll feel better talking to Henry if he's washed all this away.

She reaches out to gently take his face in her hands and kisses him softly. "I love you."

He was going to do much the same thing if she hadn't first, so he smiles softly into the kiss. When she treats him so gently and lovingly, it makes him feel cared for and precious and valued.

"I love you so much," he says quietly, smiling tiredly at her. "Thank you."

He is indeed so precious and valuable, and she loves him so dearly.

She smiles at the thanks. "I'm here if you need me," she responds, gently touching his cheek once more before sitting back. "Enjoy your shower."

"Thanks," he answers, and gives her hand a quick squeeze as a nonverbal thanks as well, before getting out of bed and grabbing his crutches, heading towards bathroom.

He pauses by the living room to let Sherlock know, in case Joan gets tired and wants to sleep, or they want to discuss the case, or anything else. "I'm gonna take a shower," he says, and leaves it at that. He doesn't bother to mask how drained he feels.

Sherlock is sitting on the couch in the living room, staring at the cell phone resting on the coffee table, hands clasped between his knees, lost in thought. He looks up at Ted's voice, blinking as he's pulled from his reverie. He nods at Ted's words, acknowledgement and reassurance that he will watch over Watson.

Ted nods back and goes to the bathroom. He looks at himself in the mirror. He looks tired and sad. He sighs, and his eyes drift down to the small 'believe' sign, and he nods to himself. Then gets undressed and wraps up his cast, and gets into the shower.

He stays there for a long time, letting his mind wander as he both metaphorically and literally washes everything away for a while.

Joan is herself deep in thought when Sherlock enters the room. He goes to sit in the chair beside the bed, not saying a word. The two of them sit in silence for a long moment.

"I need you to do something for me," Joan says, breaking that silence while still staring down at her hands.

"Anything you need, Watson," Sherlock responds.

Joan looks up at him. "I need you to find out how Ted's father died."

"Have you asked him?"

"He doesn't want to talk about it."

"Perhaps he doesn't want you to know."

Joan frowns with a sigh. "No. No, I don't think that's it. I think it's something bad enough that he can't bear to talk about it. But it still affects him deeply. His reaction to the news about Turner...it was personal. The part about Turner missing his dad. There's something there, and I want to know what it is so I'll know what sorts of things might affect him. It's like Kitty. Knowing that she had been tortured and raped by a man and barely escaped with her life was important. It helped me to be a better mentor, and a better friend."

Sherlock nods slowly. "Very well. I shall look into it. You should rest for now, though. I know you were tired when we came home, and I know you have not slept since."

"Too many things going on," she says as she lies down.

"Nothing that cannot wait," Sherlock assures her.

As expected, the shower helps, and he dries and changes into fresh clothes. He needs to do laundry soon - he doesn't have that many sweatpants. And if he's going to partially move in here, maybe he should get some extra of everything, just to have enough at each place. They should probably go shopping at some point, make this place a bit more homely, make sure they have everything they need.

He occupies his mind with those kinds of mundane planning thoughts. It's comforting because it lets him focus on the future, but not so far future as to be overwhelming in his current situation.

Ted returns to the bedroom quietly, looking better than he did when he left. He smiles softly when he sees Joan sleeping and Sherlock watching over her.

"I'm gonna call Henry," he says quietly, going to get his laptop and his phone. "Need anything before I go?"

Sherlock is happy that Ted looks better. He knows all of this has been hard on the man, and Ted's emotional state has come to matter quite a lot to Sherlock, both for Ted's sake and for Watson's.

"I believe all is good here," he says.

"Well, you know where to find me," he says and smiles - this includes texting, if Joan is asleep and Sherlock doesn't want to leave. He pins the laptop between his arm and the crutch carefully, then looks down at Joan for a second, but he doesn't want to disturb her if she just fell asleep, so he heads out.

He looks over at the couch by the coffee table, but it's still covered in files. The kitchen doesn't have comfortable chairs, and he doesn't really want to try making upstairs (especially while precariously carrying the laptop), so he settles for an armchair with a footstool. The files on the table are mostly together, and there are no gruesome photographs or anything, so that's probably fine.

Then he texts Michelle to let her know he's available to talk to Henry. Soon after she calls him up on FaceTime, letting him know that Henry will be there soon, he's just finishing up his meal.

She seems very relieved to actually see him, smiling and friendly, since they've only been texting a little bit since everything went down this weekend. She asks about Joan, and Ted tells her she's recovering well and should be fine soon, and Michelle seems relieved at that too, which reassures Ted. He had wondered how she's taking the news about his new relationship.

He also carefully broaches the subject of Henry coming to stay for a bit, sometime it works out with school. He doesn't suggest anything long-term. He wants to bring that up a bit more mindfully. And probably after Henry has actually met Joan, at the very least.

And then Henry shows up, and Ted's heart swells. He loves that kid so much. They stay on the call for over two hours, talking about everything he's missed lately, with school and friends, and a new video game he's been playing.

By the end of it, Ted feels like he's had a two week vacation in the Bahamas or something, he feels so much better about everything. He's still smiling to himself once he finally returns to the bedroom.

While Ted is in the living room and Watson is asleep, Sherlock brings out his own laptop and does a little digging. He knows where Ted grew up and roughly when his father died, and it doesn't take too long before he finds what he's looking for. It makes sense now, all of it, from Ted's reluctance to speak of how his father died to his deep desire to be kind and caring toward everyone. He worries about a certain degree of emotional fragility, what might trigger his panic attacks.

Ted returns before Watson awakes, and with a keystroke Sherlock closes the window with the police report he found related to the suicide. He looks at Ted with not a trace of evidence on his face of what he found.

"I take it your son is well," he says quietly, while Watson sleeps on.

"Yeah, he's good," Ted answers quietly with a warm smile, going to set his laptop down. "Talked my ear about what he's been up to." Which is obviously exactly what Ted had hoped for.

He sets down his crutches, but doesn't get in just yet. "You wanna get some sleep?" he asks. He's been awake far longer than Ted has by now, and Ted could manage to stay up for a while if he has to.

"I typically do not require much sleep," Sherlock answers. "If you would like to sleep, I can stay and watch over her. Or if you desire company I can also stay."

Sherlock himself would not mind remaining if Ted wants him to. His examination of the documents is at a stage where he would like to discuss things with Watson and get her perspective before proceeding.

"Staying sounds good," Ted decides with a smile, climbing into bed as carefully as possible, ready to reassure Joan to go back to sleep if she wakes.

He's not laying down though, at least not quite yet. "I talked with Michelle about Henry coming to stay for a bit," he tells Sherlock. "He has a week off school very soon, so we're gonna see if we can manage it. It's just with everything in limbo over here, we haven't been able to make any firm plans."

Joan stirs and rolls toward him, reaching out to touch his leg, but doesn't really wake.

"Watson will like that," Sherlock answers. How he feels about it is decidedly less clear cut and positive. Despite warming up to the general idea of children with his close relationship with Kitty and Archie, Sherlock is still not one who finds it easy to be around the mess and noise and chaos of a child. But Watson has wanted a child for some time now, and he's resigned himself to the idea that he will have to adapt. Her happiness is paramount. And that resignation extends now to Ted and his child, since Ted's happiness is now also of great importance to Sherlock.

Ted smiles as she rolls over, placing his hand on hers and stroking it with his thumb.

He nods and smiles at Sherlock's reply, and waits for more. When more doesn't come, he raises his eyebrows. "But not you?" he asks. He's more curious than he is worried. He doesn't doubt Sherlock will make adjustments to make it work, but if he doesn't want to be around Henry for whatever reason, Ted wants to know so he can accomodate.

Sherlock gives him a faint, almost polite smile. "My opinion is hardly material." Ted's relationship with Watson is what matters, after all. Once Watson has recovered there will hardly be need for Sherlock to be around.

"Pish posh," Ted answers immediately, though he tries to keep his voice soft. "I care about your opinion. I mean, even if the two of us won't need babysitting anymore by then, you're still gonna come over for dinner sometimes at least, right?"

If Sherlock really doesn't want to, sure, Ted can be okay with that. But the idea that his opinion doesn't matter at all is pure nonsense.

"You know, some real smart guy recently told me that what I think and feel matters because I matter. You think you're exempt from that or something?" he questions, eyebrows raised and with a slightly cheeky smile.

Sherlock is the sort of person who simultaneously is incredibly arrogant and yet has distinctly low self-esteem. The notion that people actually want him around is still somewhat foreign.

He's wryly amused by Ted tossing his words back at him.

"I would be happy to join you for dinner periodically," he says. "As for your son...I imagine I must meet him before making any judgments."

The more Ted gets to know Sherlock, the more he realises that Sherlock is extremely aware of what he can contribute through his skills, yet unaware of what he brings as a person. Such as being insightful, kind, funny, and interesting. All of which he definitely is. Ted makes a mental note of expressing these observations about what he likes about him more often.

"Yeah, that's a good way to go about making judgements about people," Ted agrees. "You were fine with trusting our opinion on Roy and Keeley though. Do kids.. like stress you out or something?" He wants to know what the potential issue. He wants to know more about what Sherlock likes and dislikes about social interactions in general.

Sherlock's mother died when he was young, his father was neglectful and seemingly wanted nothing to do with the boy, his boarding school classmates hated him and demonstrated that hatred with all manners of abuse. It turned him into a bitter and arrogant adult who pushed people away before they had the chance to reject him first. Anyone who refuses to be pushed away finds a deeply broken man beneath the facade. Things have gotten better in the past few years, but the scars are still visible, metaphorically speaking.

"Children are loud and messy and chaotic," he says, dropping the politeness. "They are, as a group, distinctly devoid of reason. What others consider cute I find at best annoying. Now, as with all groups of people, the individual may well be distinct from the collective in any number of traits. But in the aggregate, I do not deal well with children."

"Alright," Ted answers, nodding, happy to have gotten to the bottom of it. "Well that's not that unusual, plenty people think the same," he points out, not seeing why Sherlock was being all cagey about it. Personally Ted is just fine with loud and chaotic, but he gets it.

"Well, besides being a chatterbox like his dad, Henry's a pretty chill kid," Ted reassures. "You know, he likes drawing and building legos. And he's pretty smart. You might like him."

He definitely got a lot of traits from Michelle. Sometimes Ted himself is more loud and messy and devoid of reason than Henry is, honestly. He just reins some of that loudness in around Sherlock.

There are few things that will generate ill will more that expressing a dislike of children, particularly to a parent. But of course Ted would be different.

"We shall see," he answers. He'll give Ted's child a chance. For most others he wouldn't bother.

Ted knows there's a pretty big difference between finding children stressful and difficult to relate to (and therefore disliking spending time with them), and actually being mean to children. The latter is pretty unforgivable. And he can't imagine Sherlock doing that.

"Yup. But if you end up hating him, just don't tell him, and we're good," he says with a soft chuckle.

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