The Swan Queen | Sherlock

Tiny Dancer

       There were several facts I found out to be true. The first was that I wasn't dreaming. I was wide awake, unable to move from my hospital bed with someone in my room who shouldn't be here. A very dangerous someone, might I add. It was the middle of the night, so the clock on my wall told me. I could see it now because I had managed to turn on the lamp. Visitors weren't allowed at this time. If someone, anyone, were to walk passed right now they would see I wasn't alone and promptly ask him to leave. But no one came. Of course no one came.

The second fact was something of which I think I always believed to be true, I just didn't want to admit it. That my accident was no accident. It had been planned, premeditated, revenge.

Really, Jim? You couldn't have just killed me last time we met? Instead, you had me run over!

He was sitting in the chair where Finn had been hours earlier, reading my goddamn hospital notes like a newspaper. I watched his facial expressions change the more he read. The man actually had the nerve to look excited.

"Now, I'm no medical expert, but this is a nasty break," he said.

I grit my teeth together, refusing to give him the satisfaction of seeing me react. I would not cry. Not in front of him.

"What have the doctors said?" he asked.

"Oh, not much. Only that I may never dance again."

He looked pleased with that. Pleased! The bastard.

"That's a shame, what with your audition and dreams of joining the Royal Ballet."

Of course he knew about my audition! Of course he did!

He reached over and wound the music box again. After a few twists of the key, Tchaikovsky filled the room. Suddenly, I hated that tune.

"It's a good thing I was lying then," I said, my fingers twitching with the urge to throw the damn thing across the room. I turned my head to look at it properly for the first time. A little ballerina with dark hair was spinning on the spot. Keep her wound and she'll spin forever, close the lid and she'll never dance again. I reached out to touch her. Any interference from my fingers and she would stop. The clogs would still turn, determined to keep her going, keep her dancing, but she was no match for human strength.

"I never really wanted it," I continued, watching her spin. "I only said it for something to say. I only practised because everyone else encouraged me to. I never wanted the audition. I never wanted to join the Royal Ballet!"

SNAP!

The ballerina broke free from her never-ending dancing prison. The music box looked so sad now, just a thin stick rotating. I held the tiny dancer in my hand, inspecting her finely painted features. We're both free now.

"How fortunate then," said he, "that you've only lost something of which you never even wanted anymore. Things could have ended a lot worse for you."

Haha ha haha! You bastard.

"I on the other hand-"

"Lost thirty million pounds," I interrupted, "I know. You've said."

He looked at me with a dark expression. Not anger, it was never anger with him. He was always either disappointed or amused when it came to me. And sometimes, very rarely, he looked confused. Almost as if he was trying to figure me out. It sounded ridiculous because I knew he was an intelligent man, very much like Sherlock, and I, on the other hand, couldn't compare.