Counting Stars (Chapter 1)

Sherlock / The Fault In Our Stars

September

Rated: T

Pairings: Sherlock Holmes & John Watson, Molly Hooper & Greg Lestrade

WARNINGS: Drug references, language, depressing thoughts

Summary: John Watson is 16 years old and has thyroid lung cancer. To release him from his depressing thoughts of possibly dying and knowing he won't live for much longer, his mother sends him to a support group to discuss his feelings. Little does he know his life will become a little infinity when he meets a certain someone. That being Sherlock Holmes.

*I don not own Sherlock or The Fault In Our Stars. They belong to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Steven Moffat, Mark Gatiss, and John Green. This story was written for entertainment purposes only.*

69. That's how many days it's been since my 16th birthday. Not that I've been counting. Today is the anniversary of a tragic event for me, and I know, this is a depressing way to begin my story. You're probably thinking, Why the hell is he starting in such a downcast nature, but that's the whole point of this. This is the story of my real beginning.

1,095 days ago, 4.5 miles away at the local hospital, I had been told my life would possibly end ten or twenty years earlier than it normally should. I've lived three years with this disease, and now I know I will never be able to escape the painful hell I have to swim through everyday.

Five foot four. That's how tall I am. No more, no less, and it's a lot shorter height than most boys I know. But that has nothing to do with my disease; that was just a trait I inherited from my mother. I have sandy-blonde hair that sweeps over the top of my skull in a specific fashion, as I like it as flat as possible. My brightly-colored eyes match the t-shirt I have on. Sky blue, no hint of grey in them at all; just a dash of white.

Most people believe me to be just an ordinary teenager, but to be honest, I have to work twice as hard as any kid. They just don't understand the truth. Sure I'd love to have a perfect life with a girlfriend (or boyfriend...?), but all thanks to my weakness I developed a few years back, that won't happen. Nothing happens to me.

Unfortunately, I have thyroid lung cancer. My cells started to grow uncontrollably when I had just transformed into a teenager, and I first discovered it one night when I woke up and couldn't breathe. I even had to reach over to my bedside table and text my mum to come and help because I couldn't speak a syllable. She always has her phone on in case of an emergency, at which point this was.

I think it was near 3 A.M. when we went flying to the hospital. I didn't believe my mum would actually call an ambulance, but I guess the shaking state of me just sent her into a spasm. My dad came along too, despite his studies he was doing to train for the Army.

I was told I went into an unconscious condition after about fifteen minutes when they started to do some operation on my ribs from what I felt. I was mistaken when I woke up the following afternoon and had some sort of tube connected to my nostrils.

I have to wear the cannula now all the time, except when I take it off for a few minutes to get dressed every morning. The wire splits under my neck, wraps around my ears, and comes together again at my nostrils. I was diseased with a type of cancer in which my lungs fill up with fluids every now and then and I have to be taken to the emergency room to drain them. They don't pump air to my body and refuse for me to be allowed to breathe properly, so I have to carry around a large oxygen tank that pumps air through me every couple minutes. I believe it gives me two liters of oxygen per few minutes, just so I am able to be human. I have to rely on an oxygen tank to keep me alive.

I'm not even sure what the fluid is that's inside me. It somehow just seeps into my lungs so I can't inhale ever once in a while. That happens maybe three times a year, and it certainly is a scare for my parents, because one of these days they know they're going to loose me.

So, as expected, I get extra care around the house. I can't do any physical activities because of my weakness, but I've found some other things that interest me instead. Books are a great thing I've come by, as I seem to have one in my hand at all times. Mostly for school it will be a history novel, my best and favorite subject to learn about. I go to a private school to avoid any chance of being bullied or pushed around at a local school. Sure, my friends are limited, but I'd rather be safe than be the number one target on campus.

On weekends, instead of going to church like most kids do, I go to a cancer support group every single Sunday. It's pretty boring, as we always tall about the same things, but we always discuss our struggles, loses, progress with our health, stuff like that. Not even all the kids there suffer from cancer. Some just go because they have some other illness, like a permanent injury or they're deaf in one ear. The leader of our group, Phillip Anderson, has no disease but gladly runs the meetings anyways. I think his grandmother had cancer, so he has a sort of relationship with the disease. He's been immune to it a couple times, but it's never fully developed in his cells. They've threatened to grow uncontrollably before, but they seemed to pull away and function properly in the end.

My mum and I say nothing on the car ride to the small building in the middle of town. I live in central London, but it's more open compared to the city part. She also turns the radio on even if I have distaste with the music notes. She tunes the volume so its lower and I only listen to it delicately while the window is down and my blonde locks blow towards the front of my hairline. The early September breeze feels glorious on my cheeks, and I can even feel some of it running through the small gap between my nose and the tube connected to it.

My hopes kinda die when we turn into the bumpy parking lot, my mum halting the car in the far corner even though there weren't any other vehicles around. She never asks me if I'm ready; instead she just gives me a casual nod and I slowly rise from the car seat and step onto the pavement. I have a little trouble getting out and settling my oxygen tank on the ground, but eventually I am all situated and can head towards the building. Now mind you, I literally do not carry around an oxygen tank. It's in something resembling a small duffle bag that I can wheel around. The outside fabric is an Army camouflage pattern and the handle is pitch-black.

As I stride lousily over to the front of the building where I go for the group meetings, my mum rolls down the window and shouts so I can hear. "Hey, try to make some friends today!"

I kinda snort in a goofed-up way. "No promises Mum," I mumble back.

There door handle feels cold like ice, as it always is, and I slip inside and yank my bag behind me so the wheels don't get stuck on the small bump below the door's base. Just inside is an open room with a few couches and a table, but our usual gathering place is downstairs in the basement. It's not a creepy basement like most people would picture, as I guess the owners tried to make the atmosphere as comfy as possible.

There are a few kids my age around, two to be exact, and they smile and wave as I pass by. "Hey, John," they both say, making me feel welcome that morning. Both are teenagers who come to the support group; one is a girl with ginger hair named Molly Hooper, and the other is a close friend of mine. Mary Morstan was my past girlfriend once upon a time, but even though we broke up I still consider her to be my best friend. Her short, blonde hair curls on the bottom, and she always pulls it back off her face with pink and purple clips.

I head around the corner for the elevator, since I run out of breath easily when hiking up and down stairs while carrying an almost five pound tank. Even then the cannula can't pump enough oxygen into me quickly enough. Sometimes I have the ability to go down, but no way on the face of the earth could I hike up a flight of steps.

That's when I accidentally ran into him. Tall, about six foot, brunette curls for hair, lovely blue, grey, and green eyes, but the thing that stood out the most were his cheekbones. Sharp, high, they made his face look longer and leaner than it would have been without them.

First I hit his foot and then I fully slammed into him, causing the stranger to stumble back but stay on his feet remarkably. I'm extremely clumsy. The collision gave me quite a scare and I jumped in fear that I'd hurt him. Normally I'm not as cautious, since I am the strongest and toughest of any of my 'friends', but when I don't know the person, I act like a complete idiot.

Once he'd recovered and had his hands on my shoulders for balance and support, I couldn't help but yelp out. "Sorry!" I apologized, briefly glancing up at his forehead and then switching my focus back down to the tiled floor. It didn't stay there for long as I looked up to mean what I said and show it with my expression.

"Oh," was the first thing he said to me. It wasn't in a stupid way, as in not knowing how to respond, but it was more of a startled state. "It's okay," he assured, and I gave him a cheeky smile in return. His voice was deeper than it should have been for a kid only a year younger than me.

"So," I fumbled again, "are you new here?" It seemed the legit question to ask; the only one that would get me somewhere.

"Yeah. Don't understand why my ridiculous mother is making me come to these meetings." His attitude was slightly negative and I realized he judged people significantly.

"Well, the whole point of coming is because you have a disease. I'm assuming that's true with yourself as well?"

"Yeah. And?" He looked at me for a reasonable comeback. I didn't have anything to say.

"You've got lung cancer," he suddenly said, staring down at the cannula in my nose and the oxygen tank below my left hip. I raised my eyebrow at him; it was partially obvious, but the other half of my brain left me curious.

"What else do you assume?" I asked, stepping back a few paces and extending up to my full height.

"Oh, I can deduce a lot about you," he claimed, sounding so positive yet like a stalker at the same moment.

"Deduce?" I noticed, whatever that meant. "Like what?"

The unknown teenager gave a long drag of air before speaking out again. "From your looks, you've got a sister who's becoming an alcoholic. She's recently been starting to drink beer almost every night and you try to avoid her because of the emotional swings she goes through." I almost choked on my own spit. "She's recently dumped all her anger out on you for no apparent reason and now you feel ashamed that she's your sibling." This guy was insane. Not only was he telling secrets about my family, but he was also saying it to my face. I guess I asked for it, but of all the things he could say, he mentioned my sister's drinking problem. After all, she is only three years older than me.

"You yourself are quite lonesome. You injured your left shoulder when you were a child and that's why you walk with a funny stride." I opened my mouth in an 'excuse me' sort of manner. "You've got strong moral principles, which is probably why you can't trust me at this very instant. You're looking at me with such a gesture that I must be the most obnoxious person alive." I swallowed and tried to interrupt him, but he kept ranting on with haste.

"The cannula connected to your nostrils shows you're currently suffering from lung cancer, which by the way I'm so sorry to hear about, and perhaps that's why your mother thinks you're so lonely. No wonder she's sending you to a cancer support group." I actually grinned when he apologized so randomly in the middle of his sentence. "It's remarkable how much I can decipher about a human when I first encounter them by just looking at them."

"Well, to be honest, it was a bit rude," I told him.

I found it unnatural when he smiled like the clouds had parted in the sky and the sun had projected a spotlight onto his figure.

"Oh, and one more thing," he began, but I cut him off with a lousy sigh. "I'm thrilled that you're the only person I've met who can stand my behavior." I stared at him with wide eyes. I guess the tube in my nose was distracting, as he kept lowering his gaze to observe it. I didn't see why it attracted so much attention. I hated it when people stared at me in public for having a physical weakness.

I licked my lips before the corners of my mouth lifted a little. The suit he was wearing was free of wrinkles, but his outfit fit him in style. He didn't try to look fancy; I suppose it was just his normal wardrobe. Like mine being a pair of jeans, a plaid long-sleeved shirt, and my favorite black jacket. For shoes, I stuck with the classic converse sneakers. "What makes you say that?" I questioned, hinting for a sign of proof.

He looked like I was a toy but rolled with it anyways. Then, he dedicated that second to showing me the widest smile he could muster. "Because you didn't say 'piss off' when I was decoding you."

Before I could come back with a sort of reply, he swept by me with long strides of his legs. I think my heart stopped, which would have been a major disaster considering my lungs didn't function in the first place. And to add to the pile, my brain wasn't receiving messages either.

He left me starring at the blank wall without even telling me his name. I tried to digest his words but didn't come across any help. I let out a noise that was sort of like a chuckle. I was slightly confused by his ability and knowledge to do such a skilled trick, without even asking me about my life beforehand.

And yet at the same time, I was highly amused.