Wails of Wedded Bliss
Chapter 1 || Masterlist || Chapter 3
Chapter Summary: After your wedding night, you find Sherlock to be most unusual and confronting in nature.
Pairing: Sherlock Homes x wife!reader
Chapter Warnings: 18+ Dead Dove Do Not Eat, Dubious Consent, Insults, Rough sex gone too far, internal bleeding, Menstration/Period, Arguing, Typical Victorian Era Sexism,
Word Count: 9k
Author Notes: Hi all!! Here's the next chapter, sorry no smut but lots of tension. Love you all and appreciate those most that have been showing their support through comments or Reblogs or both ★
Inspiring Song: "Caprice N° 24" by Paganini
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12:49pm Monday 5th May 1890, 221B Baker Street, Marylebone, Westminster, London, England.
Sherlock, as he paced his own bedroom was frustrated...and furious to say the least...he touched the cut on his bottom lip and hissed.
He was not equipped for this arrangement. He was unprepared for the handling of a wife. He was not aware he would be so much for his new bride to take...no whore in Mayfair Row demonstrated such complaints...however he reminded himself they were experienced women...you were a new lamb.
He hit the side of his bed, hearing your crying through the walls. Guilt became his executioner.
You were so frigid, he just didn’t expect you to struggle so viciously. You were unexpectedly a savage bitch!
He decided to take a deep breath. The deed was done.
He palmed his soft red cock and wrinkles his nose at the blood. There was so much...his throat clenched, mayhaps he was too rough...normally blood excited him...normally tears and sobbing made his member thick and hard...
He eyed the trunk chest at the foot of his bed...you could not survive his flavours. There was no possibility...He was a wicked handler and he knew you couldn’t ever meet that side of him...
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12:55pm Monday 5th May 1890, 221A Baker Street, Marylebone, Westminster, London, England.
The Housekeeper slapped her novel shut. She heard the many thumps and shouts, and now she could hear the horrid sobbing coming up from the floor above...your bedroom.
She sighed...it wasn’t the first time she had heard such things from the apartment 221B. There was single difference...you were his wife...not some perfumed pretender with a pimp expecting a percentage of commission.
Mrs Hudson felt for you. She didn’t leave her apartment until she heard the stomping of Sherlock’s heavy feet going down the stairs.
Her eyes widened, surely he wouldn’t leave you when you were in such a state?
Mrs Hudson was an old woman, she knew it was expected she would ignore it and carry on with her daily activities, Mrs Hudson though knew many married women who had died from that lack of acknowledgement in a violent husband.
She stuck her head out her door and saw him making his way to the front door of the building.
“What have you done?” she scolded him as his hand clenched hard on the door handle.
His face was red. The elder gasped at the line of red rolling down his chin from a cut on his lip...His teeth were pink and set in a vile snarl.
“Nothing that concerns you Mrs Hudson, return back into your hole!” he hissed back as he left with another door slam.
Mrs Hudson tutted greatly and ignored his words all together.
She gathered her skirts and climbed the stairs to Apartment B. She slid the key into the hole and entered the premises speedily.
She heard your weeping in your room and followed to the closed bedroom door.
She wrapped her knuckle on the wood three times, “My dear,” she called, “It’s Mrs Hudson, may I enter?”
When you sobbed harder incoherently, she took it as a sign she should enter. In truth you didn’t know or have enough time to process what she had asked.
The elderly woman pushed the wood open and gasped in horror at what she saw...a naked girl...your bottom half and blankets drenched in crimson red. Your skin was covered in the stench of sweat.
She covered her mouth and tutted, “oh you poor, poor deary.”
You sobbed harder at feeling her cold hands touch your hot shoulder.
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2:12pm Monday 5th May 1890, 221B Baker Street, Marylebone, Westminster, London, England.
You hissed and sulked softly as your body sunk deeper in the warm bath water.
Your housekeeper had so kindly spent an hour filling the tub up with hot steamy water. During that time you cried and faded into light sleep before coming back to life with the painful memory of what your holy beloved had done to you
The elderly woman would come back every so often to check the packing of linen rags between your legs. For a honest moment she was afraid you might die. She called for the doctor...one she could trust...Doctor John Watson.
After the bleeding had lessened, she encouraged you to drink a cup of water and come out for the room to enjoy the afternoon bathwater...
You hadn’t said a word to Mrs Hudson this entire time. Too ashamed and shocked to form a word.
You couldn’t even form a ‘Thankyou Mrs Hudson.’ Only quiet tears would melt down your cheek.
The hot waves helped your muscles relax and sooth the anxiety under your skin.
Your head flopped on the lip of the bathtub.
With fluttering eyes... exhaustion took over and you fell asleep in the bath tub listening to the crackling of the wood and flames of the fireplace.
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6:30pm Monday 5th May 1890, 221B Baker Street, Marylebone, Westminster, London, England.
A hot hand touched your face and you gasped at the dramatic change in temperature. You were sitting in a freeze tub of water....it had gone cold hours ago...
Your eyes opened and focused on the deep smooth voice of a man. Not just any man however.
“Mrs Holmes...” he purred softly, “The bath is cold, it would be in best interest if you redress.”
Your body was incredibly weak and chilly while also impossibly hot. You were a slight dizzy and confused. Your lips parted and closed again repeatedly like a fish.
When his face met his voice and his nose and eyes came into true focus, you shivered and leant back and flinched away from his touch.
Your husband released a lengthy sigh and rolled his eyes, “Very well,” he murmured before forcing both his arms into the icy bath water and hooked them beneath your back and legs.
As he lifted you out, your stomach dropped and you squeaked, feeling that gravitational pull to which you might fall. Instinctively your arms wrapped around his neck and shoulders. You clung to him savagely digging your nails into his coat.
You felt him walk, your wet body trailing and dripping all over the carpet.
He journeyed back to your bedroom.
As the cold air hit your skin you started to tremble and felt him lay you down on your mattress.
Your mind was a mess.
Another person was in the room you noticed in the corner of your eye. You cowered in your nude state and whimpered. You felt delirious and confused.
You blinked up at the other stranger. Another man.
You didn’t know if he was real at first until his burning hands pulled from his black gloves and gently touched your knees.
“Sherlock, she’s sick.”
“Yes, how eloquently obvious Watson, check her,” you heard your husband hiss.
You tried to move away, roll and crawl but you were flipped once more onto your back, your legs weakly spread.
You groaned and your eyes fluttered. You needed to vomit.
You felt a body climb onto the bed with you. Sherlock. His thumb dabbed and rubbed across your wrinkled forehead, he hushed you softly like you were some weeping babe or startled horse.
You felt the doctors hand touch your intimates and you panicked, your breath hitched and you moaned a soft, “N-no.” You tried pulling your thighs together but Sherlock reached down and spread your knees forcefully.
You didn’t understand what he was doing and the worst thoughts washed over you, was Sherlock sharing you with another man like a sick villain?
You wept tiredly.
A cold hard contraption pierced the hole of your body. A shudder ripped out of you as you felt your vaginal walls expand.
“Minor tearing...what caused the amount of blood is your wife starting her menses.”
Sherlock sighed, “Thank god, I thought I almost killed her.” The metal object pulled out from between your thighs.
The room was lit by candles and kerosene lamps. And so in the low light, Sherlock’s face was softened. The shadows kissed his cheeks and lips.
“Bed rest and warm towels, give her a few days to rest, heal. Usually women finish their blood within a week.”
The doctor pulled away and you heard the snapping of a bag lock. You managed to catch a medical case in his hands in your blurry line of sight.
The doctor fled to your door, before he left, his hand clenched the handle and he turned lightly. He hissed at the detective.
“Be gentle next time you participate in these activities Sherlock,” John snapped, “She is your bloody wife, not your whore.”
Your husband, ever so gently pressed his hot lips to your forehead. You had not predicted such soft kindness after his mistreatment earlier today. He hummed. He held and pissed your back up, he forced you to bend you knees and slipped your naked body beneath the coverings. Your wet body soaked the sheets, your cheek dug into the soft pillows.
“My dear Watson,” you heard him snicker, “I am nothing more than a mere gentleman.” You heard the doctor scoff and shut the door behind him.
Warm hands squeezed your shoulders and rubbed your jawline.
Peaking up at Sherlock, he wore an unreadable expression...he did not appear happy nor angry, rather he appeared tired. Bags beneath his eyes could tell you that much. His bottom lip was slightly swollen, a little red line cut through it, you softly huffed, it was where you’d bitten him hours ago to get him off you.
You couldn’t believe you were back in the same bed he had hurt you in. It made you feel cold and a desire to be distant again...but the warmth of his hand and the blankets had a power over you.
Your chest was sore and a light cough climbed out of your throat.
He did not speak and for that you were grateful. It would’ve been a near impossibility to continue a conversation with him with the state of your being.
The nauseas sickness sweeping of your belly subsided. All you wanted to feel was the warm covers, the goose feather pillows and his warm hand, softly patting your head...it took you back to a happier time...a time where your father and you shared a bed and he held you until you fell asleep...some days it felt like a dream...
You didn’t want to admit it but you dearly missed those times. Sherlock smoked the same tobacco, the scent soaked in his vest. It brought you the tiniest comfort...
You yawned and lazily blinked up at him.
“Try and get some rest wife...should you need anything, knock on my door.”
And with that he climbed off the mattress. Your body flipping lightly as it sprung up. Your nose sniffled softly.
Your heart deflated, ah there it was again. The coldness, the disdain, the reminder...he didn’t want to marry you.
After his foul entrance earlier, you wondered if such a feeling was unanimous at this point.
You shut your eyes and moaned. You tried to roll onto your side...you hissed lightly at the sore stabbing of your pelvis and the stinging stretch inside of you.
As sleep carried you out of reality, Sherlock made his slow departure, quietly sliding his way to your bedroom door.
He looked over the room and shook his head slowly...this once was his friends chambers, and before that a space where he kept his fun tools and artefacts.
Now he had a sick woman in the bed, his wife whom he hadn’t meant to brutalise earlier.
You were finally snoring when he managed to find the courage to leave the room, put out the living room fireplace and finally return to his bed.
As he removed his own clothing, he stared at the wall that separated your rooms. He wondered how badly your sickness might continue and if it was permitted to leave you alone while you bleed so profusely.
He thought about how these few weeks were in fact meant to be a honeymoon, how he had most furiously refused the ship tickets to France where his brother Mycroft insisted you both go for your romance to blossom.
Sherlock had very little intention to be a romantic for a woman he didn’t desire.
He tore off his shirt and rolled his eyes at the memories that transpired over the last two weeks.
You were nothing but a baby carriage to Mycroft, the future mother to the future Holmes son. So of course Sherlock could not understand his brothers incessant pandering to be a match maker of lovers.
The detective was no small minded idiot either...he knew plenty about you just from today...he knew about you before meeting you... He knew exactly why this marriage occurred on your end.
A bastard daughter of sir Y/L/N, son of the Lord and Lady Y/L/N. This was merely a way to keep your social hierarchy to a suitable and respectable level.
He had heard and read the scandalous rumours.
You were half the soft rose and half a weed in regards to your breeding...which meant you were a weed in the end, an illegitimate, unrecognised bastard.
He sat on his bed and untied his shoes.
Sherlock was not one to participate and discriminate the classes. Many a time it was speculated by John that Sherlock might’ve been a socialist.
The detective might’ve not cared for your breeding, but he didn’t appreciate being used as a climbing ladder of society which he didn’t receive well either way.
He was using you so that Mycroft didn’t cut him off financially, you were using Sherlock so that the people of culture no longer shunned and ignored your existence.
Mycroft was a down right fool if he believed such a union could ever bring together a matrimony of love. So Sherlock accepted it quickly...this would be what it was...a contract...you now needed to complete you aide of the bargain.
You needed to let Sherlock impregnate you...
With your stunt in rebellious adversity, you acknowledged his size and struggled to accommodate him, ergo your fear, pain and bite.
Sherlock huffed, he would need to wait another seven days before he could perform his husbandry duties upon you and press his seed within.
He laid back into his covers still staring at the wall...
He bit his lip. Oh if only he could punish you for such misdirected behaviours...he wondered how willing you really were and what lengths you were prepared to take to remain his Mrs Holmes so that the meek people of the middle and upper class might continue their false smiles your way.
A wicked smirk spread along his lips...
Perhaps a innocent bride was a perfect ingredient for his most filthy pleasurable plans...
Mycroft never stated how quickly it was expected of you to conceive and carry...he just said
“Soon.” And “Before he met the grave.”
He rolled onto his side and imagined you there with him in his bed. He imagined how your body curled up into such a small figure.
He envisioned the likeness of your tear stained face and an exhausted smile...
For now he would let you rest.
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7:00am Tuesday 6th May 1890, 221B Baker Street, Marylebone, Westminster, London, England.
The sound of a loud violin cord strong woke you up from your hours of needed sleep. You groaned as your head began to ache....
You drowsily tossed your head to the direction of your door way...your eyes narrowed. Someone was playing a violin very loudly just outside your bedroom.
You sniffled unladylike as your runny nose clogged your breath. You lifted your hands to cover your ears. Onto shaking legs you pulled out of your bed and used the canopy wood to steady yourself. You walked slowly to the wardrobe and plucked out a nightgown.
You hobbled to your bedroom door and as you opened the wooden barrier, the buzz of Paganini hit your ears. You wrinkled your nose as you watched your husband play the instrument, leaning over a table covered in papers, maps, receipts and a plate of toast.
As he saw you, his eyes widened slightly...you were not dressed appropriately for the hour of the morning. At any moment he might’ve had a client come inside if it were not for his honeymoon.
“Good morning, Mrs Holmes,” said Sherlock as he placed his instrument down on the table.
You sternly eyed him. Your hands trembled lightly. His face. His handsome evil features upset you. He offered a soft smile and kind eyes. You didn’t dare fall for his trickery. From the moment you had met him he had provided a twisted exchange of false care that twisted quickly to brutal cruelty.
You decided, you did not like your husband and it was not something you would hide from him.
“My grandmother insists that is the devil’s music,” You proclaimed, “It is most wretched to hear of a morning.”
He sucked in a deep breath of air and grounded, “I do not entertain superstitious conversation,
Paganini was gifted and because of this, other composers jealously invented rumours of a pact with Satan to dissuade the public from ever enjoying the expanses of musical differences.”
You glared at him. Of course he would say something so infuriating and liberal in the works. His tone tilted on belittlement and you felt there was absolutely no standing that could allow him to talk to you like this especially after yesterday’s events.
You lightly snorted, “As it may be so, I still urge the request you refrain from playing it so early and while in my presence. It woke me up most fiercely.”
In truth it isn’t what woke you up…You could still feel him there. The memory of his violent embrace haunted the muscles of your lower half. He was like a ghost remaining between your thighs. It made you feel ill to think about.
He looked down. A deep frown on his face. He wouldn’t meet your eyes. He pushed the plate with toast closer to you, “Mrs Hudson bid you a fair morning wife, you should be up earlier from now on to receive her.”
You looked to the softly ticking clock on the fireplace mantel and blinked, “Indeed, I shall need to apologise to her,” demurely you conceded, “I usually rise by six in the morning.”
“You are ill,” Sherlock said now holding the plate out to you for your weak hands to take, “I insist you sit and eat and return back to bed for further rest.”
You wanted to raise your voice at him. You wanted to scream and yell that you were not I’ll but rather hurt and in suffering after his careless mistreatment.
You couldn’t figure out if his gentleness last night was really a delusional dream. This world around you felt like some vicious game.
You chewed the inside of your cheek. You wanted to be a spitfire and tell him he needed to apologise for hurting you yesterday before you take anything from him...yet as your insides tightened at the smell of the warm butter soaking the hot cooked bread, you obeyed his demand.
You glided over to him and lightly pushed some of the papers on the table around. Sitting at the end, Sherlock mirrored your seating and went about picking up a newspaper.
On the front was a illustration of Lord Thaddeus Pennicott, a baron who from the title of the paper had gone missing.
You looked back to your breakfast and pondered on your husband’s work. How the articles written by John Watson had designed Sherlock to be a saviour to the public with a intelligence that might put most scholars to shame. The Sherlock you had come to meet was nothing like the gazette’s description, rather he was rude, ill tempered and coarse in handling any woman.
You chewed the soft delicious toast and swallowed gradually.
It was difficult to accept but not hard to see, you had married a brute.
You glanced at Sherlock again. His face was hidden behind the paper, his thick long fingers cradled and framed the edges of the news securely as he flicked through the gossips.
You nervously fidgeted in your seat as you ate breakfast. You did not see any tea and assumed you slept through any Mrs Hudson might’ve deliver.
It was so unusual waking up in a foreign home, having to accept this would be your place of residence for as long as your husband desired to live here.
You noted the oddities of your surroundings...objects you didn’t much think of as you moved in yesterday. There was a underwater helmet, a skeleton of some type of odd mammal, and even a telescope sitting on top of a piano.
You read over some of the framed newspaper headlines which were the retellings of your husband’s crime and mystery stories.
The will to speak to him again with level head and calm tones was as hard as walking through mud up to your ankles. You squeezed your eyes shut. You couldn’t ignore him nor refuse to speak to him for your entire marriage.
You licked your bottom lip and coughed into a napkin. Looking back to Sherlock’s newspaper you nodded and called across the table, “Are you helping with the Pennicott case, Mr Holmes?”
He flattened the paper on the table and stared at you as if you’d said something obvious.
“Of course not. Clearly he’s a man who ran out from his wife. It happens more often than you think,” he cleared his throat and picked up his cup to his lips, speaking into the cup “Perhaps you should sit pretty rather than voice your false interests in my work which you have no business in.”
You didn’t like the tone he used on you. Condescending. Icy. You wouldn’t allow it to continue. You remembered your grandfather telling you to put your foot down as a new wife or else you would be unattended to. It’s not that you desired the attending after yesterday, but you wouldn’t accept rudeness.
“Sherlock,” you hummed and crossed your arms over your lap as you tongued the inside of your cheek trying to not scream at him, “I am your wife,” you said it sternly, “Not a child, when I inquire on the better part of your interest, do not speak down to me like a dog.”
You jerked your chin dignified, holding your ground despite almost dropping the last crust of your breakfast.
He pursed his lips with narrowed eyes and thought before spoke. It was a chilling moment before announced, “You are my wife, that is true...and so I shall speak to you however you tempt me to, and this very morning you’ve put me in a disagreeable mood.”
Disagreeable mood?! You refrained from rolling your eyes at him.
You sat back and sighed, abandoning the last and tiny piece of bread. He was so foul to think of himself so justified. You expressed a disinterest to his music tastes and that indicated his deflating concern for you.
Not once had he asked in your wellbeing. Perhaps he was clouded with shame? ‘he should be shameful, he hurt an innocent woman.’
“Perhaps, you should practice on controlling and restraining your moods then Sherlock,” you griped, “I do not much care for your habitable outbursts.”
For the first time you caught his face expressing a new design...shock, flabbergasted. His face grew a small hue of pink.
You smirked a little at the small victory.
His chewed his bottom lip, “My habitable outbursts?” he pried, offence costing his words.
You swallowed and nodded curtly you leant back in your chair, “Now here at breakfast, the church flee yesterday, and the marriage bed rage also yesterday.”
An indignant chuckled crawled from his throat.
“You bit me like a wild cat,” he voiced rightfully, pointing hard at the small wound still in his mouth. The redden skin was a symbol of your defiance and escape. Instead of being embarrassed, you surged with pride that you punished him in such a manner.
You quipped back quickly, “and you stabbed me like an merciless villain.”
“A villain, you say?” his brows now raised and his eyes widened.
“Quite,” You glanced down at the plate and muttered, There’s no other term for what you did to me.”
Rape was not in the current vocab for this situation you believed. You were married and he was taking what was rightfully his as husband, he could have been gentler however. Your grandmother never shared that it could be so agonising, surely your grandfather had never inflicted such abuse into her?
Your husband slowly rose from the table and leant across it. You flinched and squeezed your eyes as you feared his sharp hand. Sherlock Holmes had every strength to hurt his weak wife, so why did you feel so mouthy in the sense of easily provoking him to rage or even potential violence?
The handsome detective with hot pale hands ran his knuckle down your cold cheek...it was wet. A tear had escaped. Dear god...you were trembling and clenching your skirts beneath the table.
“I can think of a plethora of words for what I did to you,” Sherlock muttered, he pulled his hand away and scoffed, “I did not think Mycroft to saddle me with such a stupid bride.”
A fresh flow of hot tears flooded your eyes.
A growl of outrage accidentally climbed from your chest, it came out like a needy whine, “I beg your pardon?”
“Granted my dear Mrs Holmes,” he smirked and clapped his hands gesturing to the room you left, “Now off to bed with you, I see your withering state worsen by the moment. Doctor Watson informed me you needed rest during your delicate...situation. Perhaps it has brought you to these hysterical theatrics.”
A light gasp of horror and a written expression of disgust painted your face, “I shall not, nay! I shall sit an disembowel your words,” you sniffled and tried not to fall into a pathetic sob, “D-did you just call me stupid?!”
As his smile widened and you angrily threw the last piece of bread at him, hitting his chest.
“You sir,” your bottom lip wobbled “Are out of place and feverishly I have discovered your lack of empathy most stunning, that or rather the amount of your selfish conceived motion that I am a docile woman who will put up with your conceited arrogance!!”
How dare he hurt you as terribly as he did in humiliation and physical behind that he should also find it acceptable to brandish you with further insults of your intelligence.
Before he could sit back down, you slapped your hands on the table, the china tinkled as you pushed yourself up to your feet. You hissed at him as you wobbled around the wooden furniture, “You may be London’s finest Detective, but I am your wife.”
You mapped your finger harshly into his chest and snarled with great venom dripping from your tongue, “By the lord of heaven, if I had only known the telling’s of our futures, I would announce full heartedly that you Sherlock Holmes would be the very last man I would prevail to marry.”
The room fell silent. His cold eyes burned I to your gullet. He licked his teeth, left slightly speechless and unsure if he should entertain the argument any longer than necessary.
Your belly felt tight. The toast was not sitting well. You were anxiously awaiting his roar, his bite or his strike. Your chest rose and fell with every desperate breath you took as to not fall into a heap of wailing. Breathe through the pain and the fear.
He stared at your lips and fluttered his eyes, shaking his head at you.
“...Good morning Mrs Holmes,” he bid gruffly and bowed his head before leaving the table to head over to the coat rack.
“And where is it you run off to this time?” You raised your voice shakily and waved your hands as if to conjure the words of his locations destination, “The same place you fled to yesterday and yesterday evening? To hide in a bottle?”
Mr Holmes snapped his head back at you, his eyes scowered your poorly glad form beneath the dressing gown. It took everything in him not to fuck your miserable mouth off.
“No...” he swallowed harshly, “I seek the companionship of bearable company.”
Your chest tightened and the whimper left, that could’ve been anyone or no one with how mysterious your husband had proven to be.
You rubbed your hot forehead and grunted softly to remind him, “It is our honeymoon.”
During the week of a honeymoon it was deemed improper to seek or receive guests and the company of any other than your married partner.
Sherlock leant forward, right down to your cheek, his lips scarcely touching the skin of your love and jaw as he whispered hauntingly, “And your honey is blood. I shall not interrupt your peaceful rest....” he kissed your face gently, and said at a room tempt tone, “Good morning Mrs Holmes.”
Argument over it would seem.
He picked up a walking cane and a hat, leaving the flat to yourself.
You sighed frustratedly and stomped a foot like a feral child. You wouldn’t put up with this, for this is not what was promised by the outline of marriage by every book, paper and word of mouth. You crossed your arms and sniffled. You wiped your eyes again.
Sherlock made you feel more like a child than a wife with how he used his words and the looks he threw at you. It was unfair and cruel.
You were a very smart young lady and practiced the skills of refine ladyship over the years of your teenage hood. You were a paragon of brilliance and etiquette...only for some lout you called a husband to drive you to irritation so unbearable that you felt it necessary to toss your breakfast scraps at him.
You ground your teeth and returned to your rooms to pick out a modest covering wrap over the dressing gown you already wore. It would be most annoying to have to strip your body everytime you vomited or perhaps didn’t reach the bed pan in time.
You shuddered and went about washing your face and fiddling with your hair...
As you stared at your washed out features, you heard your landlady arrive...
You thought about your wifely duties beyond the bedroom. With Sherlock going off to god knows where, you were totally left to your own devices and for the very first time in years, you had freedom to decide your days habits.
You thought half heartedly about calling upon Sherlock’s brother or the Doctor Watson to grant a visit and answer some questions beginning to form in your head.
‘Why is Sherlock so different in person compared to the papers?’
‘What displeases Sherlock into his outbursts and what pleases him to calm those said outbursts to dust?’
You tried to wonder on your marriage contract. You were not entirely privy to it even though you felt you had every right. It was a deal conspired by Mycroft and your grandfather after all. You wondered if Sherlock even caught a glimpse of it.
Why did Sherlock even agree to marry you if it was only to lead to his foul manners and hands to you?
Tapped your lips and shook your head.
What does every contracted marriage consist of? Land? Babes? Livestock? Wealth? Status?
You looked around your room and out the open door to the sitting room.
Sherlock did not strike you as someone in need of money...and yet...many of these items, surely were not affordable on a wavering wage as his alone? His family wealth most likely was directed towards Mycroft as the eldest.
And then you recalled your darling sister in law, her shrieking at the wedding, the words echoed back like a tunnel, ‘I can help pay off your debts when I marry’ she had said.
So it was money...debts...and enough to cause strains that would force him to accept your hand in marriage. You tried not dwelling on being reminded how undesirable you were as a bastard woman. This newly accepted information could be used to your advantage.
A fabulous idea occurred to you. An idea that would prove to Sherlock that you were in fact not a stupid imbecile.
Helplines:
If you are a victim of sexual abuse, assault or domestic violence or know someone who is please reach out to these links that share helpline services, phone numbers or emails. Consent and respect is important in every relationship whether between friends, family or even strangers.
Australian Helpline Services
UK Helpline Services
American Helpline Services
India Helpline Services.
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At 93, he’s as fit as a 40-year-old. His body offers lessons on aging.
The human body maintains the ability to adapt to exercise at any age, showing that it’s never too late to start a fitness program
By Gretchen Reynolds
For lessons on how to age well, we could do worse than turn to Richard Morgan.
At 93, the Irishman is a four-time world champion in indoor rowing, with the aerobic engine of a healthy 30- or 40-year-old and the body-fat percentage of a whippet. He’s also the subject of a new case study, published last month in the Journal of Applied Physiology, that looked at his training, diet and physiology.
Live well every day with tips and guidance on food, fitness and mental health, delivered to your inbox every Thursday.
Its results suggest that, in many ways, he’s an exemplar of fit, healthy aging — a nonagenarian with the heart, muscles and lungs of someone less than half his age. But in other ways, he’s ordinary: a onetime baker and battery maker with creaky knees who didn’t take up regular exercise until he was in his 70s and who still trains mostly in his backyard shed.
Even though his fitness routine began later in life, he has now rowed the equivalent of almost 10 times around the globe and has won four world championships. So what, the researchers wondered, did his late-life exercise do for his aging body?
Lessons on aging from active older people
“We need to look at very active older people if we want to understand aging,” said Bas Van Hooren, a doctoral researcher at Maastricht University in the Netherlands and one of the study’s authors.
Many questions remain unanswered about the biology of aging, and whether the physical slowing and declines in muscle mass that typically occur as we grow older are normal and inevitable or perhaps due, at least in part, to a lack of exercise.
Start the year fresh
If some people stay strong and fit deep into their golden years, the implication is that many of the rest of us might be able to as well, he said.
Helpfully, his colleague Lorcan Daly, an assistant lecturer in exercise science at the Technological University of the Shannon in Ireland, was quite familiar with an example of successful aging. His grandfather is Morgan, the 2022 indoor-rowing world champion in the lightweight, 90-to-94 age group.
What made Morgan especially interesting to the researchers was that he hadn’t begun sports or exercise training until he was 73. Retired and somewhat at loose ends then, he’d attended a rowing practice with one of his other grandsons, a competitive collegiate rower. The coach invited him to use one of the machines.
“He never looked back,” Daly said.
Highest heart rate on record
They invited Morgan, who was 92 at the time, to the physiology lab at the University of Limerick in Ireland to learn more, measuring his height, weight and body composition and gathering details about his diet. They also checked his metabolism and heart and lung function.
They then asked him to get on a rowing machine and race a simulated 2,000-meter time trial while they monitored his heart, lungs and muscles.
“It was one of the most inspiring days I’ve ever spent in the lab,” said Philip Jakeman, a professor of healthy aging, physical performance and nutrition at the University of Limerick and the study’s senior author.
Morgan proved to be a nonagenarian powerhouse, his sinewy 165 pounds composed of about 80 percent muscle and barely 15 percent fat, a body composition that would be considered healthy for a man decades younger.
During the time trial, his heart rate peaked at 153 beats per minute, well above the expected maximum heart rate for his age and among the highest peaks ever recorded for someone in their 90s, the researchers believe, signaling a very strong heart.
His heart rate also headed toward this peak very quickly, meaning his heart was able to rapidly supply his working muscles with oxygen and fuel. These “oxygen uptake kinetics,” a key indicator of cardiovascular health, proved comparable to those of a typical, healthy 30- or 40-year-old, Daly said.
Exercising 40 minutes a day
Perhaps most impressive, he developed this fitness with a simple, relatively abbreviated exercise routine, the researchers noted.
Consistency: Every week, he rows about 30 kilometers (about 18.5 miles), averaging around 40 minutes a day.
A mix of easy, moderate and intense training: About 70 percent of these workouts are easy, with Morgan hardly laboring. Another 20 percent are at a difficult but tolerable pace, and the final 10 at an all-out, barely sustainable intensity.
Weight training: Two or three times a week, he also weight-trains, using adjustable dumbbells to complete about three sets of lunges and curls, repeating each move until his muscles are too tired to continue.
A high-protein diet: He eats plenty of protein, his daily consumption regularly exceeding the usual dietary recommendation of about 60 grams of protein for someone of his weight.
How exercise changes how we age
“This is an interesting case study that sheds light on our understanding of exercise adaptation across the life span,” said Scott Trappe, director of the Human Performance Laboratory at Ball State University in Indiana. He has studied many older athletes but was not involved in the new study.
“We are still learning about starting a late-life exercise program,” he added, “but the evidence is pretty clear that the human body maintains the ability to adapt to exercise at any age.”
In fact, Morgan’s fitness and physical power at 93 suggest that “we don’t have to lose” large amounts of muscle and aerobic capacity as we grow older, Jakeman said. Exercise could help us build and maintain a strong, capable body, whatever our age, he said.
Of course, Morgan probably had some genetic advantages, the scientists point out. Rowing prowess seems to run in the family.
And his race performances in recent years have been slower than they were 15, 10 or even five years ago. Exercise won’t erase the effects of aging. But it may slow our bodies’ losses, Morgan’s example seems to tell us. It may flatten the decline.
It also offers other, less-corporeal rewards. “There is a certain pleasure in achieving a world championship,” Morgan told me through his grandson, with almost comic self-effacement.
“I started from nowhere,” he said, “and I suddenly realized there was a lot of pleasure in doing this.”
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