I Know Your Face

It's The Circle Of Life

    The first name she pulled and the second were the pairs, and they had to go over to each other's seats and brainstorm for a little while as she explained the directions. It was really stressful to be honest, every name that she picked out of the hat was like a time bomb, you never knew if it were you, never knew if it would be your partner, it was a type of stress John just couldn't handle. She kept reading off names that weren't his, and slowly all of John's friends got picked, paired off, usually together, to go make a wonderful fun filled project.
"Sherlock Holmes." The teacher called as the first name, and John looked over at Sherlock, who was looking rather upset, almost as if he wanted to just work on it alone.
"And, let's see, ah...John Watson." The teacher said with a smile. John let his head fall onto his desk with a dramatic thump, making everyone's head turn to look at him. There was a chorus of laughter, but John didn't laugh. In fact, he wondered how he didn't see this coming in the first place; obviously the universe had turned against him long before he had made the mistake of cheating. Of course he'd end up with the very same rat that had ruined his life, and for an entire semester! John lifted his head finally and looked over at Sherlock, who was eyeing him from the other side of the room. John sighed heavily, getting up from his seat and walking very slowly over to where Sherlock sat, like a funeral march of one.
"Well this is...unfortunate." Sherlock decided, clearing his backpack off of the desk beside him so that John could sit down.
"You don't say." John snapped, sinking into the chair next to Sherlock and crossing his arms, refusing to look at the boy who sat next to him.
"So a project on countries and cultures sounds exciting. Should I share a Google Doc with you?" Sherlock suggested. John didn't answer, in fact every word that Sherlock spoke went right through him like a sharp blade, hurting him so badly that if he opened his mouth he was sure he'd scream.
"John? I'm not going to do this whole thing on my own you know." Sherlock insisted. John turned his head slowly, so that Sherlock could know that one more word and John would make Sherlock's neck would turn extremely quickly, in the wrong direction.
"Sherlock." John muttered. Sherlock's eyes widened to show that he was listening.
"Shut up." John muttered. Sherlock sighed heavily, but there was a smile on his face, a very antagonizing smile, as if daring John to make any other move on him. But John would, there was no doubt about that. In fact as soon as this period was over, John was off to ruin Sherlock's life piece by piece, and he couldn't wait. The teacher went over the directions, things to do and write, handing out rubrics and once more stressing how important this project was to your overall grade. John was only half listening, he could only hear an angry pounding in his ears and he could only see red, the hate for Sherlock flowing out of his eyes and ears like thick black smoke. Of course he would be paired with him, of course his bad luck would strike again and force him to spend time with this pathetic know it all.
"So John, would you like to get together after school one day and make the outline of this?" Sherlock wondered. John blinked, suddenly realizing that everyone was packing up their things, getting ready to leave the class.
"I'm sorry?" John wondered, looking over at Sherlock for him to repeat the question.
"I asked if you wanted to meet up somewhere and start this project together." Sherlock said slowly, as if John wasn't even able to hear properly.
"We've got all semester Sherlock, why would we need to start it now?" John wondered, getting up from his chair and collecting his folders and pencils that he had brought with him.
"I don't know, just get a head start maybe." Sherlock said with a shrug.
"That's unnecessary Sherlock, a waste of time." John snapped. Sherlock sighed heavily, looking at John with disappointment.
"Alright, but after that whole incident I'd think you'd take better care of your grades." Sherlock muttered, turning to zip up his backpack. John clenched his teeth, knowing that now was the perfect opportunity to smack Sherlock in the back of the head, his back was turned, he might not even know. But no, John was off to hurt him in a much worse way, he just had to leave Sherlock alone and go do his own thing. So John took a deep breath, telling himself that violence wasn't the answer and going back to his seat, cramming his things into his backpack and marching out the door. When he got to his locker there were two people waiting there for him, Greg and Mary, who seemed to be small talking awkwardly while they waited for John to come claim them. It was good to see that Greg was back to normal, or at least he didn't hate John so much that he didn't want to see him.
"Hey guys." John muttered lamely, letting the two of them move out of his way before he opened his locker.
"Hey John, I just wanted to apologize for being such a jerk. I know it wasn't your fault that we lost the game, we just played horribly and I kind of wanted to blame you." Greg muttered, sounding very apologetic. John just smiled; finally something good happened in his life. At least he had his best friend back.
"It's fine Greg, I probably would've done the same thing." he admitted. Greg smiled shyly at him, looking over at Mary as if wondering what she had to say.
"I'm ready when you are." Mary said with a shrug.
"What are you two up to?" Greg wondered as John grabbed his lunch box and shut the door of his locker.
"Secret stuff." John said with a laugh. There was a bit of an awkward silence, and Greg looked between the two of them in confusion.
"You're not going to make out or something are you?" he wondered. John just laughed, if only their mission was so heterosexual. But alas, he was off to slip love letters to the very same boy who dismantled his entire life.
"No, nothing like that." Mary assured, but that was all she said, so Greg seemed a whole lot more confused.
"I'll be a bit late to lunch Greg, if I'm even there at all." John admitted.
"Where are you going?" Greg repeated, looking very annoyed that he wasn't getting any straight answers.
"We're just going to get some uh...revenge. You'll figure it out eventually." John admitted. Mary laughed cruelly next to him, and Greg looked at them in worry.
"Don't be doing anything to Sherlock." He insisted.
"Nothing bad, just a little joke." John admitted. Greg frowned, but looked around the hallway to make sure the psychopath wasn't lurking anywhere nearby.
"He's a good kid; really, he just has a really big ego." Greg insisted.
"And how would you know?" Mary wondered.
"I don't know, I just get the impression." Greg admitted with a shrug. That wasn't enough to convince John to back off, so he just shook his head shamefully.
"Sorry Greg, but we've got to do this, it'll be hilarious." He insisted, pushing past his friend as a sort of goodbye. John and Mary waited until the hallway had cleared, leaning against the wall and watching as the last pack of kids steadily moved towards the lunch room.
"You got the note?" John wondered. Mary nodded, holding up the folded piece of notebook paper.
"You should write his name on the top, just in case he thinks it's in the wrong locker." Mary suggested. John nodded, grabbing the paper and a pen and pressing it up against the cement wall, writing Sherlock's name very sloppily onto the paper.
"Alright then, locker 221." Mary said with a smile. John nodded; looking around one last time to make sure no one was going to watch them. It would prove to be a catastrophe if anyone saw them slipping in a note to Sherlock's locker, and it would be even worse if Sherlock himself caught them. That would lead to a lot more excuse making, and of course he would go and snitch on them like he had before, and this time John would get detention for bullying. So he was very relieved when the hallway was empty, walking up to Sherlock's locker and double checking the number on top.
"Would you like to do the honors?" Mary wondered. John nodded, holding the paper nervously in his hands and wondering if this were the right thing to do or not. Was he really prepared to ruin Sherlock's life over some stupid cheating scandal? Was he really that cruel? Yes. John slid the paper through one of the vents in Sherlock's locker, listening to the notebook paper fall on top of whatever was inside.
"Alright, let's get out of here." Mary decided, grabbing John's hand and pulling him off to the cafeteria. Step one was officially over, and now all they had to do was wait.
"How are we going to know if he got it or not?" John wondered.
"We'll have to keep a close eye on him. You've got math with him third block, right?" Mary asked.
"Ya, I do, so he'll have the note by then." John agreed.
"He'll probably be so happy, it'll be so pathetic. I've got him in science last block, so I can watch him then as well." Mary decided. John nodded, but he couldn't help but feel a little bit apprehensive about this whole thing. He had to convince himself that this was going to be great, it'll be hilarious! But it seemed that the only time John really wanted revenge was when he was with Sherlock, and when he didn't have that miserable boy in his line of vision he almost felt guilty. But whatever, it was done, and surely if couldn't escalate all that much, could it?
"Oh, guess who I got paired with in history? For a semester long project?" John asked, making Mary laugh in pity.
"It's Sherlock isn't it?" she wondered.
"Bingo." John agreed with a sigh. "It'll be awful."
"you better make sure you keep all this a secret then, if you're getting all buddy buddy with Sherlock on the side you need to make sure he never suspects it's you under that wig." Mary insisted.
"I'll be careful, of course I will." John assured, walking down to the cafeteria with his lunch box swinging on his arm.
"Ya you say that now, but I feel like you're the type to leave the glasses on even when you're supposed to be John Watson." Mary pointed out. John sighed, shaking his head in reassurance.
"I'll be fine." He insisted, and Mary just smile at him, as if this were a lovely thing to do with your boyfriend, ruin someone else's life.
"This is going to be so much fun John, you'll see." She assured.
"I don't doubt that it'll be fun, I kind of doubt it's morality though." John admitted.
"It's not immoral John, don't be a loser. It's payback, stuff like this goes back to medieval times." Mary insisted.
"Cave man time." John corrected. Mary just sighed, obviously not in the mood to get a history lesson.
"That too. For centuries skinny little losers like Sherlock have been getting what they deserved from popular jocks like you. It's the circle of life John, it's got to happen." Mary insisted.
"I'm not quite sure you know what you're talking about." John decided with a little laugh.
"Don't correct me John, I'm your girlfriend, you're not allowed." Mary insisted. John sighed heavily, but decided that it was best not to argue, especially if Mary was telling him not to. Because all in all John was just her puppet, if she wanted him to buy her food for lunch, he would. If she wanted him to buy her some new shoes, he would put down thirty dollars to make her happy. And if she wanted him to play a gay kid to break Sherlock Holmes's heart for revenge, well, John would put that wig on and just go with it, because in the end, that was his role in this relationship. He only wondered what role Victor would play in his relationship with Sherlock. It would be rather funny to command Sherlock around, watching him struggle to make everything perfect for the boy he thought loved him, John suspected he would get a lot of things out of that poor kid. Satisfaction being one of them, satisfaction and revenge. The lunch period was just a time for suspense, waiting in agony for the first part of their plan to unfold before their eyes. John had to say it was going to be the first time in his life, and most certainly the last, that he was excited to see Sherlock Holmes. He was practically bursting with excitement to sit next to that nerd in math class, to observe his happiness as he suspected there was someone in this school that thought he was beautiful. Oh, it was going to be lovely. Greg questioned the two of them the whole time, trying to figure out what their play on Sherlock was going to be. John knew that they couldn't tell him, he was too soft, he would most certainly either rat them out to the principal or tell Sherlock himself, both options, of course, resulted in nothing but tragedy for both John and Mary. Of course Greg never guessed, throughout the remainder of their lunch period he wasn't even able to get close to the horrible trick they were going to play on Sherlock Holmes. Greg seemed a little bit disappointed in them, as if he didn't like the fact that they were going to pick on some poor kid, but he never interfered, he never pestered too much. Obviously he knew to leave well enough alone, and John and Mary were able to escape out of the cafeteria without having to do any explaining whatsoever. John loitered a bit by Greg's locker, trying to get a good look at Sherlock as he opened his own. The lockers were alphabetical, so he knew that he would have a much better view if Sherlock did show up. Unfortunately there were huge crowds, and the only way John would ever get to spy on Sherlock was if he went right up to the boy's locker and watched him read the note, which of course would be too suspicious.
"Don't you need to get your book?" Greg wondered, slamming his locker door shut with accidental anger, looking around innocently to see if anyone was going to complain.
"Ya, sorry, course I do, sorry." John agreed, craning his neck once more but to no extent, Sherlock was probably long gone by now. John and Greg walked quickly to John's locker together, and Greg still couldn't figure out what about this class was making John so happy.
"You're not going to do something stupid, are you? Something mean?" Greg wondered.
"Course not; it's just a joke, alright? I'm sure he'll like it." John assured. Of course he'll like it, in the beginning, who wouldn't?
"If it was you who had planned it I wouldn't be as worried, but Mary's involved, and she's a bit, well, evil." Greg admitted. John knew he probably should've stuck up for Mary, but he just laughed, nodding.
"Ya, she is isn't she? She's brilliant." He decided.
"As for Molly Hooper, thanks for asking, she smiled at me yesterday." Greg said with a proud smile.
"She did? Oh please tell." John said sarcastically. Greg seemed only too happy to elaborate, going on about how Molly had dropped her pencil or something lame and he had been the hero to pick it up for her. John knew that Molly wasn't nearly as idiotic as to go out with Greg, but obviously he wasn't going to dampen Greg's sprits, especially not in their final year at this school. They made it to math class without too much of a struggle, and thankfully as soon as they walked through the door Greg shut up, not wanting to display his inexistent love life for the whole class to see. John said a weak goodbye before walking very quickly over to his desk, seeing that Sherlock once more had his nose engulfed in a book.
"Hello Sherlock." John said with a smile. Sherlock hummed his hello, not doing much to respond. John craned his neck to try to see what he was reading, and it just seemed to be another factual book of lameness, no love note or anything tucked into it. John had to admit, he was disappointed. He was half expecting Sherlock to be prancing around the room like a ballerina.
"Having a good day?" John wondered, wanting to see a little bit of a sign that Sherlock had seen the note. Maybe he just hadn't gone to his locker yet, or maybe he was trying to keep his excitement hidden. If it were the latter, he was doing a very good job, because John couldn't tell that anything out of the ordinary had even happened to him.
"Why do you suddenly care about my day? What does it matter to you if it's good or not?" Sherlock snapped. John looked at him as innocently as possible, trying to pretend to be annoyed.
"Trying to make friendly conversation." John defended, although his intentions were sort of the opposite.
"Don't try to convince me that you care, I know enough about you to know that's a lie." Sherlock snapped. John shrugged, but obviously he couldn't defend himself, Sherlock was definitely right in this situation.
"So how was your day?" John wondered after a moment's silence.
"Fine." Sherlock snapped, pulling the book even closer to his face so that it was almost pressed up against his nose, obviously his way of telling John to go away. John sighed heavily, not really knowing what to do. Obviously he had to know if Sherlock had read the note yet, but he couldn't ask him without arousing suspicion. What if Sherlock just trashed it, what if he didn't fall for the bait at all? John sighed; this whole plan would capsize if Sherlock really wasn't gay, if he wasn't looking for romantic entanglements or if he hated humanity all together. They didn't know everything about his love life; obviously they had to be more careful next time.