Fic: Breakin' Dishes: PG/Teen

[okapi1895.livejournal.com]

Title: Breakin’ Dishes
Length: 500
Rating: Teen
Notes: Retirement!lock; Angst with an Unexpected Ending; songfic
Summary: Holmes realises that Watson is beyond the ken.
Author’s Note: For the October prompt: Tales of the Unexpected. Inspired by the lovely, poignant Ache by sans_patronymic & the song Breakin’ Dishes by Rihanna


The cottage was quiet, at always, save for the mornings when old Mrs. Whitaker appeared to keep what little house there was.

And today was not her day.

Holmes sat at the kitchen table, quietly drinking evening tea and not reading the card for a fourth time.

Watson was beyond the ken.

Holmes let the words sink into his heart, scraping, scourging, on their descent.

Watson’s last weekend visit to Sussex had been months ago. A warm letter of invitation for a return visit had been
answered with a friendly, but vague reply. Another even warmer missive had resulted in a decidedly cooler response. And a third, and Holmes realised now, final, message had prompted this curt note in hand.

Watson. Beyond the ken.

Holmes should have predicted it. He did predict it, but, like an irritating client of old, he didn’t want to believe his own conclusion.

“No one listens anymore,” Watson had said over tea as they were waiting for the dogcart to take him to the station.
Holmes wondered just who it was in Watson’s life who wasn’t listening. And he felt the sting of being the ‘no one’ who clung to every word.

That was spring, this, autumn.

Now there was a box in the corner of the kitchen, a box that might never be opened.

Blue china.

Holmes had chanced upon the set in a shop in Bond Street when he’d gone to London to see the rheumatism specialist. It was the same pattern that Watson had described, in loving detail, as belonging to his grandmother.

Holmes had carried it on his lap all the way to Sussex.

Holmes finished his tea and then retrieved a single blue teacup from the box. He turned it in his hand, looking at it from all sides.

A thump-thump-thumpa-thump rose in his chest.

Well, there was nothing for it.

He smashed the cup on the floor.

As thumping grew louder, Holmes began to dance and sing.

He been gone since April twenty
He took my love and left me empty

SMASH! SMASH! SMASH!

I’m breakin’ dishes up in here
I’ve had enough-s
I ain’t gonna stop until the Yarders bring the ‘cuffs!

SMASH! SMASH! SMASH!

Holmes was sweating by the time he took up the first saucer. He began divesting himself of clothing as he hopped and spun.

And the following morning, old Mrs. Whitaker might have had a nervous attack at the sight of him in nothing but a union suit, prancing along a trail of bare floor in a sea of blue shards, had Holmes not pressed a fiver in her hand before dressing and flouncing out the cottage, singing,

I ain’t your no-one, I ain’t your ho-hum
The bees’s telling me to seize upon a new comb.
I’m a find a man on a ma-a-an…

Holmes found Stackhurst at home and frigged him raw, then, opting for a nude swim, headed for the beach, still swaying and humming,

I’m breakin’ dishes up in here…

Comments

[thesmallhobbit.livejournal.com]

Regrets, Holmes?

[okapi1895.livejournal.com]

None! I was (temporarily) a bit done with the angst.

[scfrankles.livejournal.com]

A sad situation but an admirable reaction from Holmes. I'm glad he managed to have a cathartic experience and move on ^__^

I love your spin on the song lyrics (must admit I did have to go and listen to it on YouTube - never heard it before). Especially: I ain’t gonna stop until the Yarders bring the ‘cuffs! and I ain’t your no-one, I ain’t your ho-hum/ The bees’s telling me to seize upon a new comb.

[okapi1895.livejournal.com]

It was a moment on the treadmill. That's about all I can say. I hadn't heard of it either. Thank you!