Is John really Sherlock's best friend?

[Inge l-w]

OK, I shall probably have the whole active forum down on me again, BUT I tried to post a query about Dr Watson's 'best friend' status in S3 and it seems to have disappeared in bits and bytes.

Granted that this version of Dr Watson felt betrayed by the whole TRF debacle, granted that Sherlock, in his single-minded, arrogant way thought he could just walk into his friend's life again and all would be as it was before. Dr Watson's initial reaction is perfectly normal, but would a supposed best friend keep on hitting out in anger and egotistical self-centred maniac mode? In TEH, the whole sequence is uproariously funny, but it is DI Lestrade who responds in true 'best friend' manner.

Also, in HLV, Dr Watson is devastated by the truth, he can't handle it, so he lashes out at his supposed 'best friend'! By the time the three of them have reached Baker Str. and Sherlock knows that he has done even more damage to himself than Mary had caused previously, his supposed 'best friend', an MD, no less, can see him leaning against the door, face bloodless with the exertion, nearly swaying under the stress of it all, (caused mainly by trying to protect Dr Watson in the first place), and the only response he can blurt is "Sherlock, one more word out of you and I swear you will not need morphine!"

In the How to fix HLV thread, we have been discussing the what-ifs of Mary's eventual disappearance, but in both instances above, it is the 'kind, caring Dr Watson' who should be taken off, deleted, obliterated and definitely banished forever from 'best friend' status, despite Sherlock's blind spot concerning him. How much more penance does he think he owes the egotistical, self-centred little man for sacrificing his good name and his career to keep Dr Watson safe?

Even in SoT, it is DI Lestrade who abandons the coup of his career to go to the aid of Sherlock in true 'best friend' mode.

I'm afraid that for the sake of a few cheap laughs, the creators have compromised the most famous detective pair in fiction!

[sfmpco]

Oh, I think that's being a bit harsh.

[Inge l-w]

Dear sfmpco, first of all, I wish you a speedy recovery! Our mutual acquaintance got a bit worried that you are still coughing instead of giggling.

None of my best friends have forced me to watch them apparently commit suicide from the top of a building, although I am aware of one case where it was decidedly an option for someone, to end it all. But if I had the great good luck to behold any of my dear lost ones in the flesh again, using them as a punchbag would not have been my first choice, I would have been so overwhelmed by relief that they would have been smothered in hugs and kisses, whether they liked it or not!

By the way, I have kept vigil over a beloved friend dying of heart failure after a multiple valve operation that went terribly wrong, and of a childhood friend who died at thirty-one from acute leukaemia, leaving a six-month- old daughter behind. My own father expired in my hands from his third heart attack. I have had to listen to death rattles more times than I care to remember, so I have had first hand experience, and the 'dear doctor' is NOT my definition of a best friend!

[J.P.]

Oh, dear Doctor is also quite disfunctional. I have read good text about it, should find it today evening. He is saying right things in absolutely wrong moments, and his ability to put himself into other's shoes is as poor as Sherlock's. That's why their relationship is so interesting. As I mentioned before, John is too absorbed with himself becoming father, (how could I haven't seen it?) to care about Sherlock at the wedding party, when he tells Sherlock he's not good, he never says why, which would be really helpful.

He isn't able to speak about his feelings without making a speech (proposing to Mary, the grave, the subway, the Christmas reconciliation).

 

I too wanted to kick John and yell at him as they are back from the Leinster Gardens, but I give him a little bit credit - his life was falling apart before his eyes, his brain was probably trying to restart and couldn't because of the adrenaline in his blood. And Sherlock doesn't say anything like: guys, hurry up, I'm bleeding internally and just called an ambulance, because it is important to him that things are sorted out before he's put out of action again.

[sfmpco]

Plus you have the years of conditioning that Sherlock had imposed on John with Sherlock's snappy zingers at often inappropriate moments, so John was undoubtedly anticipating Sherlock being his normal git self at the moment when John's private life is crumbling.  John accuses Sherlock of trying to be funny because that's what he's used to, and he's not having any of it.

[Carol the Dabbler]

Since this discussion has very little to do with pictures, I've split it off from "Devastatingly Tragic "Sherlock" Pictures."  Inge, as the author of the first post in this thread, you are the official owner of it, so if you don't care for the title I've supplied, please feel free to change it.  Just edit the first post and make your changes in the title box.

 

[Inge l-w]

Dear Carol,

I am perfectly satisfied with your title. The truth is, except for enthusiastically chipping in at raising Baby Watson at 221B Baker Street, I would feel extremely diffident in starting a discussion. Tried it once, got my fingers figuratively burned and simply reply to whatever thread seems most appropriate. You are a model of patience as a moderator, but that is just my view of things. Thank you!

[T.o.b.y]

Oh, dear Doctor is also quite disfunctional.

 

YES! Finally, someone besides me is saying it! I have from the very beginning never understood why anybody thinks of John as either "kind", "caring", "cuddly" nor "normal". I think he's a pretty damaged individual and has some serious issues, above all with emotion and displays of emotion. No wonder all his relationships before Mary were failures.

 

Sherlock and John are a lot more alike, at least in the "sociopath" department, than is often claimed, at least that's the way I see them. Why else would they get along so well? And I maintain that they do get along well, in their very own weird fashion.

 

I ask all your forgiveness in advance if the following makes no sense, because I am exhausted, dizzy, struggling with a virus and have a ton of tedious, hideous real life issues to deal with right now. But I will try to argue that John is indeed Sherlock's best friend (or at least the closest thing to a best friend Sherlock will ever have), and I will base my claim on a favorite quote from one of Jane Austen's heroes: "A man who felt less might have said more."

 

Compare John's and Lestrade's reactions to Sherlock's return. Who would you say was more affected? I'd say John. Now, what does John Watson MD do when he finds himself dealing with some very strong emotion? It seems to me from what we have seen of him before that when in doubt, he resorts to anger. Heck, even at Sherlock's grave he told Mrs Hudson "I'm angry", and at that point, he did not even know that Sherlock had fooled him in the cruelest manner possible.

 

Of course John is entitled to anger. Boy, is he ever entitled to anger when Sherlock marches back into his little world "as large as bloody life" and demands to be admired for his cleverness in faking a horrific suicide. In fact, I would not have blamed John if he had never spoked to Sherlock ever again. I also think that what he says to Mary about his forgiving her not meaning that he is not still pissed and it will show at times refers to his experience with Sherlock. When they have that conversation, John already knows what it is like to forgive a loved one who commits a breach of trust so momentous that it is actually unforgivable, and I do believe, since this series always has been more about John and Sherlock than any other relationship, that the lines were written with Sherlock in mind. Heck, the whole marriage disaster between Mary and John serves to illustrate the friendship disaster between the boys. John is incapable of forming deep bonds with nice, normal, wholesome people; he is, because of the way he is and the experiences he had made, drawn to a certain type of person whom he can connect with on some unholy level but who necessarily ends up hurting and betraying him because of that very darkness that made the connection possible.

 

So, one reason why John doesn't behave exactly affectionately towards Sherlock in series 3, apart from him not being at all a demonstratively affectionate person and always afraid of being mistaken for gay, is probably that he's still pissed off at him, forgiveness or no forgiveness. And he's all the more angry because he has strong feelings for Sherlock, strong platonic feelings, mind you (at least that's my interpretation), and those we love most have the most power to hurt us.

 

The other reason I think is that John really, truly believes in Sherlock Holmes and continues to do so when everybody else, his own wife included, has learned to see through him. For John, Sherlock is a hero, someone bordering on superhuman. It doesn't occur to him that he might be unable to solve a puzzle, that he might not have a plan or that he might be internally bleeding. John constantly forgets that Sherlock is human, and he becomes upset, to the point where he's hilariously accusatory about it, when it turns out that Sherlock is as frail and fallible as the rest of us. Personally, I think those moments scare John. He looks up to Sherlock as his "commanding officer" (that line and the Sholto comparison were not strewn in for nothing), and as an army man who tends to rely on hierarchy and the stability it brings, when his commanding officer is out of his depths, that means the situation is really dire, and he becomes scared, and when John is actually scared or sad, it comes out as anger.

 

So, my point is, if I have one, that the main reason why John behaves the way he does towards Sherlock is that he loves him, and that leads to intense hurt and also an idolization which borders on ridiculous. I do not think sexual attraction has anything to do with it, except that John is all the more wary of showing how much Sherlock means to him because he's been made self-conscious and embarrassed by the many people who have mistaken them for a couple, and also because he's not quite sure whether Sherlock might not be gay, and he doesn't want to give him any wrong ideas which would lead to intense awkwardness and spoil their boy time fun.

 

Is the person who loves you most automatically your best friend? I don't know. But if John isn't Sherlock's best friend, then who? I suppose a case could be made for Molly. Only I don't get the impression Sherlock thinks of her that way. He tried, and it didn't work. He ended up calling her "John". I think for Sherlock, John is his best friend, or at least the closest thing to a best friend he can ever have. And that's what counts, probably. At least it's as good a definition as any.

 

(Boy, I do hope nobody involved with the show ever stumbles to this corner of the internet and reads my insane amateur psychoanalysis of their characters. Thank god they're probably way too busy to waste their time with that kind of thing. Although they must have based the people in Anderson's little fan club on somebody...)

 

[J.P.]

As promised, below I post some quotations from Archipelago Archaea at Tublr (took me ages of surfing through re-blogging entries to find the source). Both texts are really worth reading.

 

The author is a Johnlocker, but many of the statements apply to a friendship as well. Actually, the articles actually triggered a kind of self-indulged therapeutic process, as many of the conclusions can be applied to myself.

 

 SHERLOCK’S TERRIBLE SENSE OF SELF WORTH AND HOW MARY MAYBE EXPLOITS IT
 
When John calls him (Sherlock) his best friend, he’s shocked. He has no idea where this affection comes from, and John doesn’t tell him. People don’t like spending time with him, so he must not be fun. His interests don’t cross over with those of normal people, so he’s generally boring.
 
At the end when he begs for John’s forgiveness, he’s shocked when John calls him ‘The best and wisest man I have ever known’. Unfortunately, it’s a vague description for a man who needs specifics. ‘Best’ can mean anything, and ‘wise’ probably just refers to his intelligence.
 
In TSoT, as mentioned previously, John calls Sherlock his best friend but doesn’t elaborate on why. Later, in the stag night scene, he gets a little bit more specific, calling Sherlock ‘clever’ and ‘important to some people’, but this doesn’t really add anything. By the time we get to HLV, Sherlock still hasn’t heard anything about what he means to John. Thus, we get one of the worst scenes in show history: Sherlock telling John that of course he wanted an dangerous, clever psychopath for a wife, because isn’t that what he loves about his best friend? He never even gets to hear John say he’s angry with his wife for shooting Sherlock. All John ever explicitly mentions is her past and her lies. Ouch.
 
 
WHY I LOVE THE CHARACTER OF SHERLOCK 

Let’s be honest. John isn’t the most emotionally open or articulate of men. He’s the quintessential repressed British man, possibly even more repressed than the archetype. Sherlock has very little genuine, explicit affection to draw from. There’s the domestic sort of care: cooking and forcing Sherlock to eat, for example, but John’s a doctor. How good would it look for his own flatmate to succumb to an eating disorder? He’s violently protective, certainly, but again he’s a soldier. These are the two roles he’s built his entire life around. It would be only natural to apply these natural skills and impulses to his flatmate. Emotionally, John makes some very awkward overtures when he thinks Sherlock’s grieving in ASiB, but he’s vague about the role he intends to play and Sherlock has no reason to believe making himself vulnerable will do any good. It was only a few months earlier, after all, that John cruelly corrected his ‘friend’ with ‘colleague’. Is it any wonder that Sherlock doesn’t quite trust him with his emotions? In THoB John finally, finally, openly acknowledges Sherlock as his friend, but he does so in completely the wrong fashion. He says ‘I’m your friend’ instead of ‘we’re friends’, and he does this in an absolutely passive aggressive, manipulative fashion — implying that Sherlock owes him vulnerability. I’m not saying that John was being insincere. I’m saying Sherlock had every reason to doubt him. Even when Sherlock’s life is falling apart around him in TRF, John’s idea of comfort is to call him an ‘annoying dick’. Outright fishing for signs of affection causes John to stonewall. It is a mistake, I think, to assume that Sherlock is (emotionally*) intelligent enough to recognize John’s nonverbal affection.
 
If you wonder how Sherlock could find it so easy to make John grieve for no reason, this is it: he doesn’t think he’ll grieve.
Even John’s graveside speech gives Sherlock ample room to downplay his importance as a person.
(...)
This part’s a bit more difficult, but never underestimate the ability of someone vulnerable to rationalize away affection that’s still not technically explicit. There’s no statement of love, no ‘I miss you’, nothing like ‘I need you’. It’s implicit, of course, but Sherlock already has an alternate explana- tion: he gives John danger and purpose, and John feels untethered without it. Look at the end of TEH, when this scene is referenced again. 
 
(in the scene at the end of TEH, on the stairs)
John’s trying to talk about losing his best friend, but Sherlock’s still talking about The Work. Neither can bring themselves to talk about their feelings explicitly, so they end up having two different conversa- tions without realizing it. You’ll note this happens repeatedly on the show.
 
It’s not until TSoT that John finally explicitly tells Sherlock that he loves him as a person. If you were confused that Sherlock found this shocking, I hope the previous few paragraphs helped. Unfortunately, as with his graveside speech and his forgiveness on the train, he’s not very clear on why he loves Sherlock. ‘Best and wisest’ are very vague terms, best applied to the Reichenbach hero, not so much to the awkward, difficult, and easily frustrated genius. So it’s not difficult to imagine that Sherlock, after ruminating a bit on this declaration, could have returned to his original belief: John needs him and therefore loves him for the adventure. Not Sherlock as a person, but Sherlock Holmes, Consulting Detective.
 
*my addition

[Inge l-w]

Two objections:

A) Either commanding officer or best friend, both at the same time are impossible, like Pauli's exclusion principle!

B ) If the 'dear doctor' has anger management issues, he should heed the 'physician heal thyself' maxim before he decides that it is OK to treat the man ( forget all other tags) who freely chose to give up his good name and his reputation twice (TRF and HLV) to safeguard his life and his continued happiness (Trust Mary, the selfless git says just before he collapses!) quite apart from his willingness to give up his brother and his own life all in the name of their friendship, as a punching bag and a doormat, like forcing him into the whole wedding madness.

P. S. Dear TOBY, at least the virus can go away, other issues may stay. If you can go to the favourite fanfiction (general consumption) thread, you will see how I blundered through mine, a while back. And I absolutely, categorically refuse to wear the "silly hat"!

Dear J. P. , thanks for the informative material! And you changed your signature, I am amazed!

[J.P.]

Yupp, wedding madness. Sometimes I wonder how blind John was to ask Sherlock to organize the whole thing, and then to make the damned speech. 

[T.o.b.y]

Two objections:

A) Either commanding officer or best friend, both at the same time are impossible

 

Why?

 

I actually don't think "friends" or "best friends" quite captures what Sherlock and John have. I think that in many ways, they are both less and more. But "unique whatever" is kind of an awkward label and besides, friends is what they call themselves, and in the end, I almost always choose to believe in how people define their own relationships.

 

(Now I'm wondering if who I call my best friend would be seen as such by outsiders who saw us interact on TV. Maybe not. But she's my best friend nontheless and always will be, because I say so.)

[J.P.]

 

I have from the very beginning never understood why anybody thinks of John as either "kind", "caring", "cuddly" nor "normal".

Well, it must be the Hobbit. ;)

At first I also have problems to think the pointy ears away.

Also compared to Sherlock, everyone can look kind, caring, and cuddly. :P

 

On the other hand I also sensed a darker side of Bilbo. Which - surprisingly for me, but maybe intended by makers - links MF's performance to Ian Holm's. 

[Inge l-w]

Dear Toby, we have both read the original stories, so the creators had to go with ACD canon, since every time Dr Watson is introduced as " my friend and colleague" (general PR manager extraordinary) at least to this extent! What we make of it is another thing. Did you manage to get some rest, at least? We can always continue this after you have not so many things on your plate!

[J.P.]

While re-reading the articles I found a bit that supports my theory/projection that Sherlock is great at reading people - unless he is a part of the situation/relationship. It could as well be placed in a Molly's thread.
 

Never forget that this is a man who could not recognize Molly’s love for him until he unwittingly viewed the situation objectively through his deduction of her Christmas present. He has never been in this position with John.

  
He failed to deduce Molly's feelings for him for years - until he thinks someone else is an object of adoration at the Horror Christmas Party.
 
But he reads John in his best manner though - without knowing that the person who shot the Cabbie is actually him. And that this person will become his best friend. BTW - best being a matter of proportion - compared to others, John might be indeed Sherlock's best friend.
 
 <-- for nasty virusesss.

[T.o.b.y]

Dear Toby, we have both read the original stories, so the creators had to go with ACD canon, since every time Dr Watson is introduced as " my friend and colleague" (general PR manager extraordinary) at least to this extent! What we make of it is another thing. Did you manage to get some rest, at least? We can always continue this after you have not so many things on your plate!

 

Yeah, they are somewhere between friends and colleagues and also brothers from different mothers and... something else that I'd call unholy alliance, at least in the modern BBC version. In the original, I think the hierarchy is even more pronounced. Dr Watson at some point talks about his "years of service", doesn't he? Of course in another story he refers to Mr Holmes as his "patient", so... it was complicated even then, I guess.

 

:lol: If I only wrote stuff around here when I have little on my plate and am rested, you all would have to put up with me a lot less. This place is a nice distraction. And I am quite an insomniac, so rest is sometimes hard to come by even when I am free to seek it. But that's okay. (Imagine Sherlock croaking "I'm fine" here :P)

 

[sfmpco]

Well, they put up with a lot from each other...and according to Mrs. Hudson's graveside speech, there was apparently a lot of fighting between the two (I'm assuming yelling/shouting not fist-fights), and I imagine John did most of the yelling because Sherlock was being irritating, which Sherlock is very  good at (and poor John can only take so much!).  And she also mentions the firing of guns at half past one in the morning... so apparently SH let off steam with John's gun at other times as well.  She gives a little insight into all his "carryings-on" that we are not privy to as an audience, but that John undoubtedly lived through.  And John put up with it and more.  And Sherlock put up with John too.  For John, despite everything, he considered Sherlock his best friend. I don't know that Sherlock had ever really considered those words about John, even though he experienced great comradery with John.  But I think that's just the way Sherlock's brain and heart work - that he keeps a wall up at all times... because he gets in trouble when he lets his guard down.

[sherlockandjohn]

My initial reaction to s3 was that the friendship had been damaged, but not entirely for the same reasons as posed above. And since then I've had lots of time to think about it (thank Mofftiss for loooong hiatuses!) and have gained a different perspective.

While understanding John's anger in TEH 100%, I also wanted him to eventually get to the point of acknowledging openly how happy he is to have Sherlock back. This doesn't quite happen - but, reading between the lines, it kind of does in the bomb-on-train scene. John says "I wanted you not to be dead." He's basically saying that Sherlock is horrible for having kept him in the dark, but when all is said and done he's just incredibly happy that Sherlock didn't die - and still really, understandably, angry that the man hadn't said anything back then!

Quite frankly, I was surprised that John forgave him so quickly! I mean, it only took a day or two - but, then again, I'm not sure he has ever fully forgiven him, even though he said "I forgive you". Personally, I fully understand that anger, considering the fact that Sherlock didn't seem too upset about what he'd had to put John through, or, for that matter, about not having seen John for two years.

Sherlock didn't just jump to save John, Mrs. Hudson and Lestrade - he planned and carried out a method of bringing Moriarty down, and in the midst of it all, John's life was put in jeopardy. So of course Sherlock would jump to save his friends - but his main goal from the beginning had been concerning Moriarty. My point here is that Sherlock wasn't being selflessly heroic - he was being clever and logical, as usual. Not that I mind, at all, I'm just saying that his act doesn't make me think that John owes him gratitude to the extent that his gratitude would overrule his anger.

In HLV, John's world is turned upside down again, so if he's furious with the woman who betrayed him, and with the man who also betrayed him in the past and is now defending Mary - and saying that John is damaged - I understand him completely.

 

Certain events of s3 are, in some ways, tragic, and they influence John and Sherlock's friendship. To me, they don't stop being best friends, but they have got some emotional scars, that's for sure. In the end, though, Sherlock doesn't blame John at all, and I think that's what counts. Even if we can find cause to blame him, he still is Sherlock's best friend, because Sherlock deems him so. And I truly believe he still does by the end of HLV.

 

Also, in HLV, Dr Watson is devastated by the truth, he can't handle it, so he lashes out at his supposed 'best friend'! By the time the three of them have reached Baker Str. and Sherlock knows that he has done even more damage to himself than Mary had caused previously, his supposed 'best friend', an MD, no less, can see him leaning against the door, face bloodless with the exertion, nearly swaying under the stress of it all, (caused mainly by trying to protect Dr Watson in the first place), and the only response he can blurt is "Sherlock, one more word out of you and I swear you will not need morphine!"

 

To be fair, Sherlock has just dropped a bomb on John, saying that he deserves Mary - and this straight after John has found out that she has been lying to him about her very identity. Of course he doesn't want to hear that he deserves someone who's betrayed him!

 

Even in SoT, it is DI Lestrade who abandons the coup of his career to go to the aid of Sherlock in true 'best friend' mode.

Well, Sherlock contacted Lestrade. He couldn't very well have contacted John in this situation, now, could he?

 

That being said, it's taken me months of considering and analyzing this series, as well as lots of chatting on this forum, in order to gain a new perspective. I don't know if that's good therapy or getting even more screwed up :P

[Inge l-w]

Dear friends,

First of all, thank you for not jumping on me the moment I stated my worries!

Second, I read dear J.P.'s contributions from Tumblr, and especially the first makes no sense to me as a rational human being.

Dear Toby mentioned the lovely toddler discovering the world in another thread, and I have been and shall always remain like that, (which may go partway to describing all the potholes I have crashed into on AoO). At age five, I was given a standard Binet IQ test and measured 163, but in my entire academic career, my VERY FIRST injunction to my students has been " Feel free to ask any question at any time. If I don't know, I shall get back to you during the next lesson."

To lighten the mood, I always quip "There are no silly questions, but sometimes we (academics in general) may unintentionally give confusing answers." Truth to tell, I have always gone by the Ancient Greek principle of lifetime learning, or I learn as I grow older! What shame is there in not being Q from ST:TNG?

[jadpdr]

Hi! If I took everything that pair of creators has served up so far as written in stone, I would have lost it by now!

They like to play with their fandom while indulging in their own fan fantasies,never mind the collateral damage to the characters or their fans!

In response to the original question, my answer would be a very emphatic "NO"! Dr Watson in S3 has gone beyond best friend status, bewildered and angry, tangled up between his "I am not gay" assertion and his discovery of his feelings for both Sherlock and his former assassin of a wife. However, his treatment of Sherlock does n o t show him as the great detective's best friend, neither in their fictitious world nor in real life. Sherlock is shown as plotting Moriarty's demise with Mycroft in TEH, but that plot twist is entirely implausible and patched together. One only needs to see his reactions on the roof of the hospital, practically tearing his hair out in desperation, to realize that the whole plot to take down Moriarty was very much an afterthought!

[J.P.]

While understanding John's anger in TEH 100%, I also wanted him to eventually get to the point of acknowledging openly how happy he is to have Sherlock back. This doesn't quite happen - but, reading between the lines, it kind of does in the bomb-on-train scene. John says "I wanted you not to be dead." He's basically saying that Sherlock is horrible for having kept him in the dark, but when all is said and done he's just incredibly happy that Sherlock didn't die - and still really, understandably, angry that the man hadn't said anything back then!

 

There is a little line of Sherlock in that scene that might be overlooked, because John is raging all over the place. And it is also only one sentence that sound sincere among other words basically mocking John about his declaration: I DIDN'T KNOW YOU CARED. Which is true: Sherlock cannot read between the lines, and John never communicatd this clearly.

 

Sherlock is shown as plotting Moriarty's demise with Mycroft in TEH, but that plot twist is entirely implausible and patched together. One only needs to see his reactions on the roof of the hospital, practically tearing his hair out in desperation, to realize that the whole plot to take down Moriarty was very much an afterthought!

 

Actually they should both go to John's therapist. Or take Mary as a counselor and talk the whole thing through. Because John still haven't heard a clear statement about Sherlock's dissapearance either.

 

As for them fighting: I think it is great when you can fight with someone at times and still be the person's friend.

 

Edited to add: We still don't know what really happened at the roof. Which reactions were genuine and which acted. We still don't know what Sherlock knew. It think I really am going to have a word with someone...

 

[Inge l-w]

Dear J.P.

On another thread about S4 and the creators, dear Arcadia thought it might be a good idea to bring Irene's riding crop along in a discussion about what the fans have had to go through because of ambiguities and unresolved issues. You might actually pack one along for the convention I personally would run miles in the opposite direction than attend, just to make sure your word is listened to?

Also, I reiterate, Sherlock has twice thrown his reputation and his good name away, not to mention his very life, to keep Dear John safe: what he gets in return is blank stares, angry put-downs and quite a bit of ingratitude. As relationships go, it is very, very one-sided (forget all tags and interpretations).

[J.P.]

Imagine the faces of security folks at the airport.
I might stick to Tickling & Interrogation though.

[J.P.]

Also, I reiterate, Sherlock has twice thrown his reputation and his good name, not to mention his very life, to keep Dear John safe: what he gets in return is blank stares, angry put-downs and quite a bit of ingratitude. As relationships go, it is very, very one-sided (forget all tags and interpretations).

 

Well, dear John need a clear messages too. I wonder if he knows about the snipers? Sherlock assumes that John will understand, John assumes that Sherlock will understand, but it never seems to happen.

 

They are both self centered gits. Maybe that's why they can go along without killing one another.

[Shadow Dweller]

Wonder how often John had become an unwitting test subject for Sherlock's experiments prior the latter's resurrection? How often he witnessed Sherlock's 'bit not good' behaviour where the detective bulldozed over other people's feeling either because of his own ignorance to social clues or because he can? And this time, Sherlock even have a gall to crash one of the most important events in John's life, a night when he's about to propose to Mary. Sherlock even appeared in a manner like performing magician who just pulled a trick out if his arsenal. Wouldn't it be a logical to think that John's reaction actually make sense in light of his past experience with Sherlock?