There's no such thing as fairytales. 

No such thing. 

Not real.

Open your eyes and see the reality behind the fairytale, because princes don't get to be kissed by pretty boys in flowy black coats that have eyes like steely fire, John, wake up.

***

When he was small, before his parents got divorced, and his mother remarried a man that smelled of beer and unhappiness, he used to paint pictures on his walls.

Not, like, Van Gogh, per sé. More like a twelve year old that liked color.

He splattered it across plaster, into crannies that previously had no light, and his mother would rip out her hair in frustration because "Goddammit, John, can't you go a day without vandalizing the kitchen?"

He'd giggle.

John liked being twelve. It was nice.

But then he turned thirteen.

Thirteen felt like being split in half, father against mother. He didn't want to leave his mom but he didn't want to stay, either; he didn't want to subject himself to the torrential downpour of undoubtedly horrible boyfriends his mum would gather over the years.

His father left so willingly that John didn't have time to process exactly what had happened. There was no negotiation, or pleading, only a complete removal of his name from their household. John's dad would call to insist that John stay the weekend, but his mum would refuse, time and time again.

The acrylics dried up, and the brushes were ruined by years of disuse. He stopped painting, and each line he drew was violently rejected by another. It all screamed, "No!"

Ten years later, when John puts his pencil to paper, it feels exactly the same. Like a childhood wasted.

***

When he was small, before Mycroft turned too old for his own good and his mum passed into a place a little more pretty - Sherlock. Loved. Snow.

Snow was white. And it fell from the sky in fluffy soft representations of rain, reflections hidden in ice like mirrors and glass. He flew across the snow in sleds made of wood, hands red from the cold, breaths hot and damp, sprouting from his lips in a burst of smoke. He dreamt for love in the snow angels he made, swooning into their arms, a silver touch of ice-white feathers cradling him and whispering love songs in his ears. He looked so nice, wrapped inside the cold, adorable blue-green eyes bright and playful; gorgeous, raven black hair almost completely contrasted against the snow. On cold days, he'd lay in it until his toes were numb, until his back was soaked; until the only warmth he had was leeched out of his soul and onto the ground. 

He shouldn't have stayed out that long. 

He shouldn't have let the snowmen, with their vegetable noses and beady black eyes, steal away his warmth. He shouldn't have allowed the snow angels (which were really just a silhouette of who he was) to sap at his heart until it was nothing but a cold, hard shell.

So when the snow turned into rain, when the rain turned into sorrow - Sherlock watched it trickle down his chest with hardly a sound. 

He started to wish that it'd stop snowing.

***

Words have a way of catalyzing reactions. 

John stares emptily at Sherlock for a few moments with a rather blank expression, like someone had taken a photo of him and pasted it across his face. Sherlock isn't sure if this is the right reaction, so he stays silent, and waits, and twiddles his thumbs. He can feel a snarky remark coming up from his bowels, but he doesn't dare say it - because he feels like John is mentally teetering at the edge of a chasm.

What if he doesn't love me?

What if he doesn't love me?

What if he doesn't love me?

It takes John a moment.

To have it fully... sink in.

And then, it hits.

John thought it would soothe him. Like a quiet confirmation of presence, it would gently whisper in his ear, bring him peace, bring him calm. He is wrong. It is not a gentle tap on John's conscience. It does not press prudently into his scalp, asking to enter. No, no, no. It is... a supernova. It is a sun imploding in on itself. A thousand seas collapsing into a thousand shores simultaneously, a galaxy flickering and dying like a lamp on a turbulent night. His eyes move, and he can hear the wet flesh slide as he blinks, every part of him screaming for some sort of release. He can hear... everything. He can see, and smell, and touch and taste, every part of him alert with adrenaline that may or may not come from something not of this earth.

He looks at Sherlock.

Whose eyes are icy; whose skin is flushed and red, an apology no doubt forming at his lips. 

John holds his breath, a sincere look of anguish knotted into his brows. What does he say, what does he say, dear God, what does he say?

Does he lie? But what is lying, exactly - what does he feel? 

It's too soon. They've only been together for, what, six months? Months that feel like seconds. Six beautiful, beautiful seconds, that might have gone in slow-motion if the time was right, but this is... this is sudden, and unwelcome, and John feels ambushed by the words. They hang over him in clouds, and John wants to shoot them out of the sky so he can hold them in his hands; so he can say it back, but he just can't.

How could anyone love him, anyway? He is a jigsaw puzzle that doesn't click, it feels. Like he's smashed some "almost-pieces" of him together so the conundrum looks pretty, but it fucking doesn't and it pains him. So, how? Is it a trick? An anomaly? Does Sherlock not mind waking up at three in the morning to push a screaming John back into bed like he isn't a rabid animal? Does he like watching John limp across his hardwood floors? Does Sherlock like his shitty flat, and his shitty therapist doing nothing for his shitty life? Does he like his smile, which uses so many teeth that it begins looking maniacal, or his sarcastic half glares that burn down bridges and build walls?

Sherlock, truthfully, loves everything about John. From his smile, to his eyes, to his glares, to the way his fingers hold a pen; he loves the limp and the way his nostrils flare and how his right arm clenches when he's under duress. Sherlock notes basically everything; from the smell of the cigarettes to the scuffs on the bottom of John's snow boots - he notes soft depressions where he has lain so many times, now fitting John, with his wide ocean eyes and his agape lips, pink and cold and... beautiful. Beautiful, and uncertain. And that's okay. 

Sherlock pays attention to the exact tone of John's voice when he finally speaks, even if it's one word that means essentially nothing. The way it breaks at the beginning, before the word even starts - the hopefulness in the vowels, the harsh reality behind the consonants.

He wasn't expecting this, honestly. He'd expected a monologue, full of earnest apologies and heartfelt stares that meant something that Sherlock didn't want to translate - but it isn't that. And that's John, as per usual; he stops the cogs, and spins them backwards until they break and fall away. Another wall taken down; another defense mechanism torn apart, until John walks right into the core of him, where everything tender and fragile lays.

Sherlock tries not to act too in awe, most of the time. If John were as brilliant as he was, he would've seen through that quite easily. But now...

He can't hide it behind walls of mental illness and things that claim to his mind, or the family that he doesn't have, or the father he doesn't want. Now, gears and cogs melt away into the acidic reality of it all:

"Marvelous," John breathes.

And Sherlock thinks that it is absolutely, definitely... marvelous.

*** 

After a while, the snow turns to rain, the threat of March quickly clipping at Sherlock's heels. With that rain comes watercolors, and with those watercolors comes frustration of a more creative kind.

"I told you." Sherlock looks at John with a kind smile in his eyes, tracing his fingers down the lines like they have literal texture. "It's..."

"Awful." John stares disapprovingly at his canvas, eyes cringing distastefully at the mess of sketched out experimental contour. "It doesn't look like her."

"What does she look like?" Sherlock mutters, slinging his hands across John's shoulders, and pressing his chin down against the back of his head.

"Really... soft."

"John," Sherlock snaps, "I mean physical attributes, like brown eyes or a strong chin or black hair."

John nods absentmindedly. "I know," he says. "It's just..." he leans back, squinting his eyes and running hands across his scalp.

"Just what, John?"

"She looks like you. Except, soft."

Sherlock hums in an exaggeration of a shrug, pulling away to leave John to his painting.

Her eyes are so brown that they look like pools of dark chocolate, like puddles that ripple in warm, sweet waves. They crash against sand made of porcelain that moves like silk, in a slow, churning "ssssh;" and John's tried to paint her skin, which is rosy - a beautiful, evened out texture, but he can never capture the shadows as well. They're always too dark, like her wavy hair, and there's too much contrast. She's so much warmer in John's dreams. So much more familiar.

So much more... violet.

He shouldn't have even tried, honestly. It doesn't look like her at all. In the drawing, her eyes are squinted, and cynical, and her brows are pin straight. Furrowed in a thought that is much too troubling, the motherly aura completely gone. John doesn't know the woman that is staring back at him, so he strikes his eraser haphazardly across her eyes until she can no longer stare.

"Try again," Sherlock calls loudly from the kitchen. "Eventually, it won't look insufferable."

"How do you know?" John yells back.

"Because," Sherlock yells, "you're completely incapable of creating something that lacks beauty."

"Incapable, am I," John mutters to himself, staring down the woman with no eyes on his canvas. He thinks Sherlock hasn't heard, but alas, he yells a loud, "Yes, John! Incapable. Not able to. Not even if you tried very, very hard."

"I think you're believing in me too much." He hears footsteps as Sherlock approaches him from behind, holding a croissant and a cup of tea. Sherlock leans down to push on the back of his head, and shrugs.

"I believe in John Watson," he says with a cryptic little smile, lips bending gently into each other, making a flirtatious line.

God. Sometimes, John just wants to kiss him.

Instead, John pouts. "Fine. But if it turns out awful, it's your bloody fault."

Sherlock sits down in John's lounge chair, and brings his legs up to his chest. "It won't turn out awful. Don't be so ridiculous." He grins. "If it does, blame it on the rain."

A/N: aw

y'all prolly were like omg john is totally in love with him!!1!

that doesn't mean they AREN'T THE CUTEST COUPLE IN EXISSSTENCE AJANSHDBSHTHFHFHFHFHHFHF

i like how sherlock likes snow that should be a thing make it a thing pls amen okay

pls leave a cote? or a vomment

god bless u lil ones