Well since I just finished The Slashman last night I guess I know what I'll be reading at bedtime tonight.  

Really amazing. And she cannot have anticipated it, the fic was one of the first I read and it was completed in March 2011, long before it became known that Amanda would play the part. There are not many fics around that portray Mary in a negative light but they are usually quite good. Because they went for the less obvious choice, I suppose. 
She writes so beautifully. There are passages that are absolutely perfect, not just as fanfic, but as literature in general. 

Read the first few chapters last night.  Already in love.

You were quick, then. Glad you enjoyed it. A gem, isn't it? 

And more from there: Mary at a crime scene

Burst of anger: why is John contaminating crime scenes with his amorous affairs?
I’ll never be able to remember this murder fondly, at this rate.

“That crumble is burning.” Mary, walking across the kitchen, a bloodied towel in her hand. “Aren’t they going to arrest her?”
“For burning a crumble?” I ask. Curious.
“For killing her husband, of course.” She rinses the towel in the sink, twists it to get the water out. “I presume his body is locked in the cellar or something. Did you check?”
A wry look. She’s surprised me. Would have thought this little domestic scene would fool her, her own desperate shame would hide the results of such obvious infidelity.
But apparently not. (The woman has removed her wedding ring, thrown it at the wall. There is a condom under the couch, a pair of knickers stuffed in the bin. So obvious what happened.)

Mary is not as fastidious with her clothing as I am with mine, nor is she as neat and tidy as John. Someone else he needs to clean up after: I sense a pattern.)

Last edited by Harriet (September 5, 2014 7:35 pm)

The only thing I didn't like too much was the way they got rid of Mary. But that is a minor issue.

The Progress of Sherlock Holmes (ivyblossom)  Sherlock and John in front of the TV - hilarious!

In about twenty-five minutes, a documentary about socially destructive sexual behaviour in Bonobos is going to come on the telly. John unlikely to watch the whole thing, but since the thrust of its argument is present in the introduction, it will set the proper tone. John sitting on the sofa with me, eating an apple, watching some chat show. I have a report on my lap, which I am perusing.
(Clearly: can watch a documentary and verify some lab results at the same time.)

He gets up to dispose of the core, and when he sits back down, he is partially sitting on my toes. I wiggle them.
He goes back to watching his show, but wraps his right hand around my ankle, absently, and strokes his thumb back and forth from the top of my instep up, across the soft point between my talus and calcaneus bones. Catches me; didn’t expect that. A strangely intimate touch. (Breathe. Breathe.) Feel my phone buzz: a text. Don’t care.

In the Chinese tradition, stroking this spot is thought to stimulate the groin. While I know very well that the body’s organs are not mapped out in the feet, linking this particular spot to the groin might have been done for real physiological reasons; must research this phenomenon later. Concentration is shot. Vision goes a bit blurry. Retain enough awareness to avoid drooling. Pretend to be absorbed in the report all the same. Blissful. When he stops, I notice he’s switched the channel without my noticing. John may or may not have seen the documentary at all.

Last edited by Harriet (September 12, 2014 10:55 am)

The Progress of Sherlock Holmes (ivyblossom)

A nice glimpse of Harry during John and Mary's wedding ceremony:

Harry and I both sign as witnesses, while Mary’s two giggly friends look on and snap photos. John looks sharp and serious in his dark suit; Mary looks happy in a green dress (she has the decency not to wear white, which is atrocious anyway). Harry looks marginally perturbed; either she doesn’t approve any more than I do (and if so: perhaps I have met a new friend), or she’s concerned about how long it will be until her next drink. (She looks like John; same sharp eyes, plastic, endlessly readable face.)

And these three (they belong together) made me hold my breath and laugh and cry 

“You’re late.” Hold out the weapon, still in the evidence bag.
“Took me a while to get here,” John says, sheepish, and moves toward me. Limping. Limping badly, using a cane. (New one now: wooden. Gift. Oh. Gift from Mary. She had to purchase it recently because John’s limp returned while they were away from London. She picked it out for him, thinks he likes it. He hates it. Makes him feel like an old man with an old man’s cane. His grandfather had a cane like that. The ugly metal one was better, more medical, less geriatric. More hopeful that the limp is temporary. This one suggests that he’ll just have to live with the limp, pretty it up a bit with a gnarled and bourgeois-polished stick of wood. No. It won’t do at all.)

“John.” He’s at the door now, he stops. I don’t need to see him to know that he’s fiddling with that pretentious wooden monstrosity. “Give me your cane.”
He limps toward me. I extend my hand back, don’t look behind me. Don’t need to see; I know how he looks, just now, a bit ashamed of the limp, confused by it, frustrated. Hoping against hope that I don’t mention it. (I don’t. I never do.) Hiding a little behind his over-long fringe (as if he can). He slips it into my palm. “Thank you.” Moment of indecision; axe? handsaw? The simplest is clearly the chainsaw. Walk over, pick it up, John’s dreadful cane in my left hand.
“Sherlock?”
Tuck the cane under my arm and pull the cord on the chainsaw. It starts up on the first try. Hold it in my right hand, drop the cane into my left. One single slice, right in the middle. The bottom half of the cane hits the floor. (Tacky golden tip, all chipped and ugly. Looks like someone’s chewed on it. Been getting far too much use.) I shut down the chainsaw.
Look over at John. He looks stunned. Confused.
“That’s terrible,” I say. “Tragic accident, your dear cane. What a shame.”
He starts to laugh.

I walk over to the door and pick up the plain black metal cane I brought with me, Hand it to John, handle first. “That will have to do instead.” It’s the perfect size for him; I ordered it to fit. (It helps, of course, that I know the exact length of his legs and arms, the choreography of his gait; I was able to specify the precise right size to suit. He will discover at some point later on that I had his initials engraved on it, just under the handle. Small letters: JHW, placed so he can run his fingers over them when he’s bored. He won’t notice now. He’ll notice later on, when he’s at home, and runs his fingers over the brushed metal.) Not quite as workaday as his original one (given to him by the hospital, no doubt, scuffed from previous use), but solid, unpretentious, and (above all) obviously temporary. “It couldn’t be helped.”
“Thank you.” He smiles at me. Surprise written on his face. Gratitude. Affection.

maryagrawatson wrote:

The entire fic was so quotable, but my absolute favourite line was '‘I’m so tired, John,’ said Sherlock.' Out of context, doesn't mean much. In context, it's heart breaking.

Absolutely. So much heart breaking from the first chapter on, but very well done.

The Progress of Sherlock Holmes - ivyblossom

Mary and John pay a visit in Baker Street kitchen

“...Are these...” The beginnings of a question. What could she be looking at? The pigeons (preserved in formaldehyde; not that interesting)? The sliced asphalt? Oh of course: the fingernails.
“Yes.” Best nip that in the bud. “Yes, they are, human fingernails. Don’t worry, they were removed postmortem.”
John, opening up a crate, is stifling a laugh. “So, how shall we do this?”

“Honestly, James, do you eat food that’s come out of this kitchen?” Mary, the hard heels of her shoes (heels, not blue) pecking at the tile as she walks around the kitchen table. She hasn’t noticed. James. An amateur’s mistake. Switching out names. Names placed in the same mental category: loved ones, children, pets, colleagues, friends, lovers to whom I am lying. Still hasn’t caught it. “You must need regular doses of penicillin.”

John: his face moved from amusement, contentment, tired but resolved peace, to absolute agony in the space of a few seconds. His whole body is tensed up. His hands in fists, his mouth squeezed tight into a sharp white line. The colour is gone from his face. Even his knees are tense. That was like a physical blow; John wasn’t prepared, didn’t have his guard up. Mary can’t see him; there’s a stack of crates between them. She is wandering through the kitchen like its some kind of department store display, and John is self-destructing.

Here's a little Silent Auror for a change - Vena Cava

Sweet John guards Sherlock in hospital after Mary's murder attempt

When he gets back to the room, Sherlock has fallen asleep again. John gently slides the cannula back into place and sits down, taking Sherlock’s hand again. Hand-holding can be very therapeutic for a patient with this level of injury, he reminds himself.

Hospital food vs Home-cooked 

Sherlock goes on painstakingly eating his soup.
“This is rubbish,” he says after awhile, and gives up on it. “Your soup is much better.”
“It was tinned,” John says, not looking up.
“Always?”
“Every time.”
“Oh.” A silence falls...

Getting ready for going home to 221b

The Belstaff goes on next, then he tells Sherlock to sit down in the visitors’ chair (John’s chair) and puts on his socks and shoes for him. It feels odd to do this with a grown man, dressing him as though he’s a child. He’s decidedly not a child, and it shouldn’t in any way be at all arousing to be putting clothes on another person. He’ll ignore that thought, thank you very much.

If only...

Sherlock is dismissive, clearly having what he considers more important things on his mind. “John, I – ” he stops, nudges his nose against John’s.
“Yeah?” Good God, if he’d known Sherlock was a cuddler years ago…

Heartbreaking Sherlock - after the first time ...

“That’s better,” he says. “I wanted to do that. I’ve wanted to for a long time. Particularly since your stag do.”
“Really?” John says. “If you had, I probably wouldn’t have protested. I would have known that I should have, but… who knows what would have happened. You thought about it?” He adds, unable to keep from asking, wanting to hear it.

“A lot,” Sherlock says. He puts his fingers on John’s scar, touching it lightly. “I used to masturbate thinking about it, in fact.”

A hot prickle goes through John. This is incredibly arousing, something he’ll definitely need to think about again, and frequently. “You used to?” he asks, though. “You don’t any more?”

Sherlock shakes his head. “After you got married and the fantasy became impossible, it lost its allure.” He pauses, seeming to be searching for words, then says, “Look, John. I know that I’m… no replacement for Mary. I know I’ll never quite be enough to fill that gap. But I can learn this. How to do this. I can be better than I used to be. I promise.”

Last edited by Harriet (October 3, 2014 6:18 pm)