be the witness of my shame.

The way to the bedroom (his, assigned, not theirs, for some reason he doesn’t want to do this in their shared bed, hers and her boyfriend’s) is full of pit-stops, hungry snogging up against the hallway wall, her t-shirt falling victim to his impatience, dragged over her head, ruffling her short, blond hair and making her laugh nervously. She sighs something that sounds like his name, when his hands move up over her abdomen, the slight outline of muscle and flesh, softer than -- it’s a drag of fingers across skin. John, she whispers, but he’s too preoccupied with touching her and consequently, forgetting himself to pause. To listen. To care. A second later, her fingers are grasping him by the neck and his left shoulder, making him grimace, if only slightly, into the kiss. She still tastes a bit like toothpaste, but mostly she tastes like something sweet and honestly, quite addictive.

If he can’t have his drink (and if he can’t have Sherlock), he’ll take a dose of sugar instead.


-*-


They land on the bed, Mary on her back, John on top, though he keeps his weight off of her, on his knees and his hands and she’s so small beneath him. It’s been a while since size distribution was on his side in bed (if you disregard how having a beanpole for a partner certainly has its advantages, yes, he thinks he’ll disregard, actually, disregard), so he takes a while to just milk it for what it’s worth, kissing his way down the slope of her shoulder, collarbone, breasts -- God. Lips trailing from one to the other, he spends a good while, probably also longer than he would have back in those heterosexual days of his, on working her nipples into hardness and his own body is reacting much as he’d expect it to, his cock growing hard gradually and his pulse racing ahead. It’s not good, not as such, in so many ways it’s probably the worst idea (impulse) he’s ever pursued, but he needs to not think and Mary is moaning very nicely, very prettily and when he slips one hand down between her legs, she’s wet and willing and pushes up against his palm.


-*-


He eats her out like someone trying to drown themselves -- and perhaps he is.

Mary is loud and her hands are insistent, fingers scraping along his scalp while he sucks at her clitoris, lapping at it with just the tip of his tongue, then the full, flattening length of it, then his lips closing around it softly again and she’s gasping. Around his fingers, she’s starting to contract and he tries not to think about anything else, anything else at all, no associations, no similar (and yet not very similar) situations that exist, ghost-like, at the back of his mind. Just this, this moment when she climaxes against him, half-choked and quivering.

His body is beginning to protest how he ignores it and that’s fine, too (it’s all fine).

There’s a time for everything, it seems. You should think this was his. You should think.


-*-


Pushing inside of her is overwhelming enough that his eyes fall shut and he leans his forehead against the pillow next to her head, making her turn hers and kiss the side of his face, just below his ear, jawline, the corner of his mouth.

She’s wet and warm and tight around his length and for every time he draws back, pushes forward, there’s friction, too much to bear and he’s groaning, trying to hit the right rhythm, hoping to God that Mary’s going to take care of herself from this point onwards, because he can’t even concentrate on anything but the flexing of his thigh muscles as he thrusts forward, the muscles in his arms straining at the position of his upper body, raised above her just slightly.

Usually, he can last quite a while, if he wants to make an effort about it, but he’s beyond that point at the moment, can’t really give a damn and the pace ups fast, Mary gasping against him, flexing her hips and good, it’s good… It’s good (it isn’t, not really, though).

When he comes, it’s hard and fast and he screws his eyes shut, gasping into the side of her neck where she smells like faint remnants of Diorissimo. Her hands are caressing the back of his neck, down over the slope of his shoulder blades, down his back, along the line of his spine. She whispers something into the night that he doesn’t hear for the buzzing in his ears, but it was probably well-meaning, encouraging and he’ll take it, whatever it was. He’ll take it.


-*-


After he’s pulled out of her, he rolls off the condom, tying a knot on it and dumping it on the floor for now. He’ll throw it away when he leaves.

Because he’s going to leave. John Watson always seems to, right?

They lie together for half an hour, though, with Mary resting her head on his chest, his arm around her and they don’t say much of anything, though she draws patterns on his stomach that could be letters, spelling something out that he’s not making an effort to figure out.

“I’m sorry, John,” she says eventually when they both feel the first tremors in the calm between them, making him move to sit up. “It shouldn’t have been like this.”

“No, it shouldn’t,” he replies, swinging his legs out of bed. A moment’s pause, then he turns around enough to lean in and press a kiss to her forehead. “Sorry, but I’ve got to go.”

“Of course,” she says.


-*-


Throwing the condom out in the bathroom bin when he goes to shower, he can tell that he’s now done not thinking. It’s not a flood of thoughts or feelings, but rather a very large wave of nothing that washes over him. Mary stays in bed and watches him while he gets dressed, packing his rucksack quickly, efficiently.

“See you,” he manages as he exits stage left (thank you for your help).

It’s six. If he catches a cab, he’ll be home within the hour.