sto morendo dal crepacuore, fratello mio

[punchmeitssubtext]

It was something of a given that the Holmes brothers tended to intrude on one another's privacy without either warning or apology. After a difficult adolescence and young adulthood, it had very nearly become habit (which, in retrospect, probably explained a good deal of the resentful and angry behavior), although that habit had somewhat faded after Sherlock's false death and resurrection.

Until today, at least.

The door of Mycroft's home banged open, and Sherlock stormed in, bringing a gust of the rain and muggy air from outdoors with him as if it were generated by the billowing drape of his coat. With no explanation aside from several furiously muttered obscenities, he slammed the door behind him and then practically threw himself onto his brother's couch, curling up in an awkward, angry ball.

Comments

[the_government]

Mycroft waived his hand airily. "I suppose we could succeed at those if we cared enough to try. And I beg pardon, I've always been ridiculous? Where you prance around in flapping coats and too-tight shirts? Hmph" His voice is sharp, but a twist of his mouth and the twinkle in his eye shows he's making fun in jest.

He fingers the knot in his tie, still perfectly taut as always, the pin keeping it from slipping. He sighs, leaning back on the sofa, his hand returning to rest on his brother's shoulders- a point of contact, keeping them grounded together in physicality is doing wonders for their relationship so far.

"It is different. It matters. Why is this sentiment, why this one man matters to you above any other."

A thought occurs to him, and he looks at Sherlock quizzically. His brother had always flamboyantly rejected normality, pushing any human emotions out of his system. But this emotion...even though it pained him, his brother clung to. Much the same as he himself had clung to his wreck of a brother, even as the downward spiral of drugs turned him into someone unrecognizable.

"You haven't tried to quell this attraction using chemical means, though. That's...quite interesting."

[punchmeitssubtext]

Sherlock makes a soft, contemplative sound; he's still leaning very slightly against Mycroft's shoulder, as if it's a muscle memory from his childhood days. As a little boy he'd quickly discovered that leaning on his brother afforded him an excellent view of Mycroft's sketchbook, or the sheet music he was reading, or something he might be building for school. It was a safe position, a position of knowledge and warmth, and now that he's older it's a little startling that that hasn't changed.

"It wouldn't work," he says. "It's too different. And anyway the problem isn't the attraction. It's..."

He pauses, trying to think of the right words, the right way to communicate the shape of this thing that's so wholly outside the realm of their experience.

Briefly, he recalls one of Mycroft's secretaries--an ambitious but anxious man whose accent placed his upbringing near Cornwall. While his brother was consciously careful not to betray himself, that secretary had given them away in a very specific manner. Every so often Mycroft would say something, or make a reference to their strange childhood, and the man would have an unconscious moment of looking utterly surprised... as if he were hearing certain words in certain combinations for the first time, as if he had suddenly stepped into totally unknown territory and found it fascinating.

He'd been replaced by Anthea four months later. But the image stuck with Sherlock; if he'd noticed it, he knows, Mycroft must have picked up on it too.

"I'm never bored," he finally manages. And it's true: while they have something that passes for a domestic routine, John is constantly surprising him. The cocaine had been an escape, a way of speeding up the world around him, but its effects had been predictable. Even now that he and John are intimate, he's constantly discovering things.