In her defense, Mina really did think twice about calling John before she did. However, she thought once, then twice, then had two more drinks and that landed her in the pool of questionable judgement that she was now floating in. It was late, but not too late. She figured John would likely be up because he often had as much trouble sleeping as she did; though their respective insomnias were for very different reasons.
After John answered and asked if she was alright, Mina sang-spoke the words back to him. They were song lyrics, after all. Not that John would know that. There was a 50/50 chance he’d be cross with her for calling at this hour, so she figured she’d try to be cheeky or cute at the top of the conversation to sway him. It did not seem to work.
“No, John…I mean, I may be a little drunk but the rest–that’s not why–ugh…” she started and stopped her words several times before letting out a sigh because he clearly was not charmed by her flirtation.
“Yes,” she said firmly. “I’m alright, everything is fine. I’m sorry for calling so late…” she said calmly. Of course she did miss him, for more reasons than one. She’d only seen him a handful of times since she came back to London, and needless to say it was not the reunion she was hoping for.
“Have you spoken to Sherlock recently?” she quickly asked, faking a reason to have been calling him.
As soon as Mina mentioned Sherlock, John’s stomach became a twist of emotions. Tension, stress, irritation.
❝ No, Mina, I haven’t spoken to Sherlock recently, ❞ he answered with a sigh. ❝ Does he have something interesting to say, or are you just using that as an excuse about why you called me? ❞
John was tired. Not physically tired; although his inability to sleep had really began to catch up to him. But he was exhausted from trying to juggle so many lives at once. Mina had returned to London and expected everything to be the way it had been before. That wasn’t possible. John had told her this. He had told her this time and time again, or at least it had felt like it. But as many times as he’d told Mina that, he had told himself the same, tenfold. He wished things could be like they were. He wished he could make things right again, keep everyone happy -or at least content, like he’d been able to before. But now was different. It was very different, and John did not know how to handle it.
He wanted to hang up on Mina. It was the smartest solution, John could see that. But he couldn’t hurt Mina’s feelings like that, even if she were unlikely to remember any of the conversation in the morning. He also found himself unable to hang up because he did not want to hang up. As wise as he knew leaving Mina alone would be for everyone, he didn’t want to leave her alone. As many consequences as he knew this conversation may have, he didn’t want to avoid taking the risk.
So he stayed silent and waited for the voice on the other side of the line to answer him.
