A/N: I update Tuesday and Friday (respectively the worst days of the week and the best :D) have fun and leave those vomments heheheh

"So." This conversation had been hanging in the air all day, hidden behind Claire's smiles. She'd been reading, mostly. ("We have another charity event next month, and they want us to learn about Thomas More." "I'm starting to want to read Machiavelli." "Dictators are much more fascinating.") Every once in a while, her eyes would glance up at John, who was fidgeting in his seat, unsure of what to do with hands, aching to speak. Most of the day, he was able to control it. But she was filling up the kitchen with smoke and he absolutely hated it and he was willing to cause an argument if it meant she would actually talk to him. The meat in her hands was thick with blood. It got under her fingernails as she washed it under the sink, her cigarette glowing. Smoke was oozing into the living room. John couldn't take it anymore.

She looked up, her cigarette wiggling between her teeth. Her bloody red fingers moved up and took the cigarette from her lips, leaving a red imprint on the paper. She said nothing, staring at John expectantly.

"Last night, what did you think?"

"About what?" she said, her voice soft.

"You know." John leaned onto the counter, his form tight and facing the adjacent wall. "Sherlock. His whole" - he gesticulated - "magic trick."

Claire paused, her face blank. The cigarette was ground into the metal of the sink. "I don't know, John." She buried her head back into the work as blood swirled down the drain.

"Alright," John said. The kitchen was blanketed in a silence that John had no idea what to do with. "Was he always like that?"

"To be honest, I truly have no idea," Claire responded, her fingers working the meat. "I met him once before. He seemed perfectly normal. He had a frankly dazzling sense of style." Claire shook her head, sucking on the inside of her cheek. She brought the meat from the sink into a bowl, the contents pink, like a tongue.

"When?"

"1938, maybe 1939. It was at one of my father's weapon conventions, and Siger Holmes was selling."

"He's a CEO?"

"No, but he owns vital stock. He's on the board of the company that sells weapons to our army. And SIS. And MI5," Claire added. She removed spices from the cupboard, laying them out in a row. "On paper, he is necessary to sign off on any major corporation decisions."

"I take it they're wealthy," John mused.

"The wealthiest." Claire sprinkled sea salt onto the meat, along with rosemary. "Now that Mycroft Holmes is climbing up the ladder, their names will no doubt be in the papers."

"Mycroft Holmes?"

Claire looked up at John. "The brother. Sherlock Holmes's brother."

"Wouldn't we see him?" John asked.

Claire's hands were turning pink. "He's not really the type to come to parties. He's practically in Parliament."

"What's the general consensus about their family?" John questioned.

"They're very... isolated." Hair fell in her eyes and she nearly wiped it away, but then remembered as she spoke. "Mycroft is essentially an intellectual powerhouse who spends all his time shoving his head up the Prime Minister's arse."

"Sherlock...?" John kept his voice in check. He needed to sound casual, but not too casual. Interested, but not too interested. It was a fine balance. Maybe he was overthinking it.

"No one really knows," Claire responded. "The first time we met, he acted respectable. It was like he was intent on impressing me." She shrugged. "Maybe it's something he can turn on and off. Like a tap."

"But - I mean, his niche. What's his..." John looked for the word, "'thing'?"

"The only thing that they know for certain is that he is a virtuoso when it comes to music. He can play essentially anything. He's been Buckingham to play for the King, Carnagie Hall for the Americans" - she paused, her face crinkling - "Sydney Opera House - he is irrefutably a genius, in mind and in art."

John nodded, once. "And, ah, what he said." He felt nervous about breaching the subject.

"What did he say?" Claire responded, looking back to her meat. She massaged the spices into it, her hands covered in bits of sticky matter.

John chuckled, his body turning to her. "You know, Claire."

"Why do we need to discuss it?"

"I don't know," John said, "because it's important? Because it might affect our marriage?"

"Because you think he's right," Claire sighed. Suddenly, she turned to him. "John," she declared, "he's not right."

"You don't want to talk about it because you think he's right, too," John said, a finger coming up to point in accusation. "You don't like it."

"He's not right, John. And you - all you suddenly want to talk about is Sherlock Holmes."

"He's the bloody most interesting thing that happened in weeks," John said, scoffing. "I mean, look at us! We're practically bathing in domesticity. I actually want to kill myself."

Claire shook her head, going back to her dinner. "I'm not stopping you, John," was all she said.

John, desperate to keep the conversation going, asked: "What did you think about what he said to Jackie?"

"I think it was absolutely rancid," Claire said, a hint of anger poking through her usually bored tone. "I think he was being horrid to her, poor girl. A man comes up to you and says he wants to go on a date and you think he's being nice. But all he's doing, really, is trying to upset you."

And John knew it was stupid of him to say; he knew, but he had absolutely no self control and he knew that, too. He let it slip between his teeth and it let the sin soak his tongue like tonic. "What if that wasn't all he was trying to do?" John said.

Claire stopped working the meat. "What do you mean," she replied.

"What if Sherlock had some ulterior motive to being there?" John asked, his body betraying him. "Claire - he doesn't look like the type to follow his father's orders."

"I hope not." Her eyes became hard as she added mint and touches of thyme to her seasoning. "People say that his father is a monster."

The sun seemed to set, in that moment. Her body dragged as she stepped into the meat, her hands thick with salt and blood. "Really," John pondered. "And why's that?"

"He sells weapons for a living," Claire replied simply. She lifted up the meat with two hands and put it into a metal pan, finally gesturing for John to put it in the oven. He walked over, put the meat inside and heard the water rinse Claire's blood stained hands. She suddenly spoke up, her voice tentative. "John, I've wanted to ask you something."

"Go ahead," John answered as he shut the oven.

Her body shifted to John, her body draped in soft, opaque linens. In the low light, her red lipstick looked brown and muddy. "Why was he talking to you?"

"You mean..." John gestured, pretending to be unsure. He knew exactly what she was talking about.

"He seemed so... close to you."

John shrugged listlessly. "He didn't want anyone to hear."

"So...?"

"Stock," John stated, his tone definitive. "He wanted to offer us stock. I said no."

"Hmm." She pondered, for a minute. Her hair was wild and agitated as her fingers ran through it, the inside of her left cheek hollow from suction. Claire looked down at the checkerboard floor. "And," she blubbed timidly, "I know I said that he wasn't right - I know, I just-"

John was silent, his eyes flickering to Claire's dainty shape. He could almost see her freckles.

"What did he mean about children," Claire whispered, betraying herself with a pink blush. Her birthmarks blended into the rose of her cheeks.

John fidgeted, looking to the door, to his escape. "Probably nothing," he said, as he eyed his way out. He could just leave her there. Not answer anything. Stop it before it started. "Nothing," John affirmed uselessly, avoiding her gaze.

"I want to have children. I don't know how he knew, or - or why he brought it up-"

"He was trying to aggravate us," John concluded. "Don't..."

"No," Claire objected. "He wouldn't bring it up unless it were relevant." She paused. "Do you want to have kids?"

John was silent. His arms crossed as he finally met her eyes, his gaze hard.

"I knew it," she breathed as she shook her head. "I knew it."

"It's not that."

"Yeah, John. Yeah, alright. And when were you planning to tell me? For God's sakes." She pulled blonde hair from her eyes. "Sherlock Holmes knows my husband better than I do."

"Don't act so above it all," John responded bitingly.

"What the hell does that mean?"

"You act as if you tell me everything."

"I do, John. I do, and you don't listen."

John shook his head. "Can we please not argue about this?"

"We're not arguing, we're discussing," Claire said, picking up a pack off of a nearby shelf, her eyes fixated on it, ready to tear it open.

"You just reached for a cigarette. We're arguing."

She stopped, and her eyes shifted to John's. "Fine, John. Bloody fine. Let's argue." Claire slammed the pack of cigarettes next to her on the kitchen counter.

"You exhibit no self control, you know that?"

"Let's argue, if it makes you so damn satisfied," she bit.

"Claire," John said, his tone dark, "not now. Let's talk about this later."

"Why not now?"

John gave her a judgemental look, raising his eyebrows and folding his arms across his chest. "Because, Claire." He scoffed, incredulous. "I don't actually like to argue. I'm tired and I just want to eat dinner without you throwing a fucking fit. Alright?" He leaned his head back into the plaster, and shut his eyes.

"Why can't we have children?" she prodded. "I thought you loved-"

"I never - I never said we couldn't have children, Claire. I just-"

"But you don't want them. I can tell that you don't." She folded her arms, and changed her posture.

"I don't, Claire. Got me." He put his hands out in front of him, mimicking the action of being clasped in handcuffs. "Take me to the station, Ms. Tabbot."

"Cut the sarcasm, John, it's very unbecoming. Give me an actual reason why we can't have children. I mean - this could be our... our..."

"Our fix? Just say it," John said, his hand wiping across the air to indicate a declarative statement. "Just bloody say it to me. The war ruined us, and we're going to be the couple that has a child to save their marriage."

"We're not married-"

"And that's not the point. I'm not having a child with you just to-"

"And we're not broken-"

"Just to... to... reconcile, or - or, rekindle our-"

"John," she said, in her warning tone. "John. We aren't rekindling anything. We're just, you know, refocusing our efforts."

John's eyes widened in shock, and he almost staggered back from it, incredulity thick in his tone. "You want to get pregnant so I'll spend more time around you? Are you bloody serious, Claire? Are you joking?"

"That's not what I said!" Claire insisted. "That isn't, and you know it. I just..."

John scoffed, shoving his way past Claire. She followed, talking hurriedly all the while, trying to make him stop. "We've been so unfocused recently," she said, quickly, urgency thick in her voice, "We've been floating around in this cloud of... of uncertainty, and we have no real focus on anything, and I think a baby might help us find it again."

"We are in the middle of a world war, Claire! We can't support a child! We can't support ourselves!" John yelled, whipping around in the middle of the hallway.

"The hell we can't," she spat, "how do you think we got this house? With fairy dust?"

John's stomach dropped, and he changed his stance a couple of times to compensate for the weight of his throat. "That was your dad," he said, choking on the words. "Your dad bought the house. We don't have any money, Claire. You know this. You know we can't bring up a child in this climate."

"My father can and will pay for the child, John."

"We're not his charity case, Claire," John said, voice dark, slow, rumbling. He sounded like he was breathing through fluid, water thick and heavy in his lungs. Claire barked out a laugh that John was not aware she had. The noise made him rock back ever so slightly on his heel, almost imperceptibly. "You act like one," she spat, sarcastic bursts of laughter poking through her speech. "Every time he comes over, you pucker up to him. You want my father's money."

"This is completely off topic!" John shouted at her, trying to keep defensiveness out of his voice.

"You just don't want to hear it because it's true!" she protested.

"I don't want children, Claire! Not now!"

"Not now, not now," Claire mocked. "When, John? When? 'When will you come home, John? When will you pay attention to me? When can we have kids? When will the war end? When will we get married? When will we have children?'" she shouted, waving her hands around in a mess of discord. "When? When? When, John?!"

"I DON'T KNOW!" John shouted, his face going pale under the blue light of the sky, "I don't know, Claire, is that what you want to hear? You want to hear me say that I don't know when the war will end? I don't. I don't. Okay? I don't. I have no clue. I don't want to have kids. I don't want to have kids, Claire - and you know why? You know why? Hmm? You'll have their entire future planned out for them. Where they go to college, who they'll date, who'll they'll marry! You're exactly like your father, and you don't even know it-"

"Well, you didn't marry my father, did you?"

"MAYBE I BLOODY WELL SHOULD'VE!" John roared, his chest heaving, eyes alight. Shallow breaths were escaping him at a rate that otherwise should've been impossible. There was a damp, heavy silence. His heart was pounding - he should've just left that comment where it belonged: at the base of his throat, where no one but he could hear it. He had to fill this silence.

With rocks. With gunpowder. With hatred. Words. Something.

Claire did not avoid his eyes, which were burning like the fires of hell. "I think it would be a good idea if you slept on the couch," was all she said in response. She sounded collected. Cool. Calm. John hated her with every fucking bit of him.

How could she do that? How could she look at him with those cold eyes and expect anything less than animosity?

He could feel his engagement ring throbbing on his finger. It burned him. The white gold shone in the dark, and he could see her eyes glint as she glanced down at it. They stood like that, frozen, in the hall, for what seemed like forever - and then, like clockwork, they shifted, snapped into place.

Her footsteps were heavy as she walked away.