Before Holmes Met Watson (FEATURED)

Day Twenty-nine: Glasses

The arrow of time points in only one direction. We know the present, forget the past, and are blind to the future. We move towards equilibrium, which somewhat ironically means everything tends towards disorder and decay. Tea and freshly baked scones cool to room temperature. Dead bodies decompose. Destruction marks the passage of time. But when you get down to the nitty gritty of it, really down deep into those tiny bits and pieces that make up the universe, into the laws of physics that only a handful understand, it seems that time could slip backwards. But it never does. Something we can't quite wrap our minds around presses it to march onward, always forward. Great minds believe the agent of that forward movement is a coming together, an intertwinement of elementary particles called entanglement.

#

Sherlock's claustrophobic bedsit wouldn't do any longer. There wasn't enough room to think. He'd gone to the research labs at St Bartholomew's hospital to clear his mind. He'd spent most of the morning nosing through other people's experiments, hoping to find something of interest. There were a few noteworthy studies underway, but his mind continued to rebel. Carefully executed experimentation could sometimes settle his thoughts, so Sherlock headed back to the lab where his mushroom extraction had gone so terribly wrong. It was disquieting being back there, and he wished to avoid any further dramatic incidents. He carefully selected his glassware, inspecting each piece then washing it thoroughly. Empty vessels to be filled, he thought, lining them up in order of volumetric capacity at his workstation.

Glass was chemically unreactive in nearly all circumstances. That's what made it so useful in a lab setting. Inertness was an enviable quality, Sherlock thought as he prepared his solutions. His overreaction in Sussex had been plaguing his thoughts, leaving him cringing each time he was reminded of it, which was constantly. He liked to think it was out of character for him, but the incident had left him wondering just how well he understood himself. It was impossible to be wholly objective about oneself. Nevertheless, appreciating the size of the blind spot that had been obscuring his view of his emotional centre had shocked him. Something inside him had been shaken loose, and he was determined to put everything back in its place.

At least one good thing had come of the scene he'd made. His parents' guilt over their mistreatment of him led them to source a flat for him. An acquaintance of his father's owned the building at 221B Baker Street and was letting out the upper rooms. There were two bedrooms, and the rent was on the expensive side. If he kept up at The Copper Beeches, he would have been able to manage it on his own, but setting his mind, his life in order meant he had to re-dedicate himself to his detective work. That meant his income would often be unpredictable.

I need a flatmate, Sherlock thought as his acquaintance, Ian Stamford, an anaesthetist at the hospital, entered the lab and greeted him warmly. Ian was a decent bloke, Sherlock thought. He might know someone I could tolerate.

#

Entanglement.

There is a profoundly romantic notion at the centre of it.

Two particles become so deeply connected one cannot describe them independently even if they are light years apart. To put it simply, they share the same existence.

#

John Watson needed a flat share.

He was keeping up his daily meetings with Harry, and they helped. A bit. Not enough, though. His face was still turned towards the darkness, and he was mired in melancholia. The slight improvement was enough for him to recognise what a shambles his life was, though. His Army pension and disability benefits should have been sufficient, but his gambling losses and careless spending were catching up with him. He wouldn't be able to afford his hotel soon. He was being wracked by waves of nauseating anxiety that made his hands tremble and his head spin. He couldn't afford a flat on his own, not anywhere half-decent, not anywhere that wouldn't halt his wavering progress.

The insomnia was back. He couldn't tell which was worse – the steadfast lethargy that had had him sleeping fourteen hours a day then waking shouting from terrible dreams or this distressing, jumpy feeling of being perpetually half-startled.

John knew the dangers of self-medicating in his state, but he'd never been much of a drinker and needed to take the edge off. He headed to Criterion Bar. A couple of boilermakers were in order.

John liked Criterion Bar. It was old-fashioned and quiet, not trendy enough to attract pushy tourists. In addition, they never played any sporting events. That helped keep things calm. John took a seat and placed his order. Behind the bar stretched an enormous mirror. There was a staggering assortment of glasses stacked up on mirrored shelves in front of it. John stared at them and felt the sudden urge to start yelling and smashing them. Strange, destructive thoughts kept rising up in him, and all that crashing and splintering was suddenly the thing he wanted most in the world.

John's boilermaker arrived. He took a sip and wondered if he was even in a fit state to live with another human being. He might snap and burn the flat down. Who would put up with that?

#

Two particles so closely linked they shared the same fate. No matter their separation in space, they were linked in time.

Einstein called it "spooky action at a distance".

#

Ian Stamford left Sherlock working on his experiment and walked, moving forward, following the arrow of time. As he walked, a baby cried, his colleague smiled, a bottle fell and broke – each event part of a chain that stretched back to the beginning of the universe. Something acted on something else, which caused a reaction, which caused more things to act on other things. Causality. Or at least that's what we call it.

#

"The objective world simply is. It does not happen." A famous physicist said that.

#

Ian walked from Barts to Criterion Bar, following the arrow of causality, closing the distance between his old medical college classmate, John Watson, and Sherlock Holmes.

You can read about Sherlock and John's first meeting in the sample of my novel, SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE ADVENTURE OF THE PAPER JOURNAL, also posted here on Wattpad.

Ian Stamford's point of view is shared in the sample of my collection outtakes and deleted scenes, THE PAPER JOURNAL CHRONICLES, also posted here on Wattpad.