Name : Sandra
Age : 34
Date : November, 4th
City : London
« It’s absolutely fine to be different. Don’t feel you have to apologize for it. » Benedict Cumberbatch
« Doubt the sun doth move ; Doubt truth to be a liar ; But never doubt I love. » Shakespeare in Hamlet
« Jesus ! Sherlock, she loves you. » / « Yes. Like I said, human error. » Sherlock Holmes answers to John Watson
November, 4th
Today, I decided to begin a diary. Why ? Because something happened to me this morning, something which will change my life forever, I am sure. What happened ? You probably want to ask me. I’ll tell you later. First I will write what people write when they start a diary...
My name is Sandra. I am 34 and I live in London. I love movies and novels but only fantasy and sometimes detective ones. And I hate more than anything love stories. One last thing about me before I told you what you want to know : I don’t believe in eternal love. Oh no : I didn’t believe in
eternal love. Because today I changed my mind on this.
Today I met someone very exceptional. And I fell in love with him.
It was magic (only for me I guess). I always hoped something magic would come one day in my boring life of mortal. And it was this Man...
His black hair was in battle array and he had a very particular face. A beautiful and strange face but the face of someone always lost in his mind-palace and who isn’t really on Earth. His eyes were like dragon’s ones, always ready to pierce the secrets of a world he doesn’t understand and which keeps him prisoner of himself, inside him.
But I can’t write anything else on him now. So good memories... I am too captivated by his image, and the few words he told me today...
November, 5th
Hello my dear Diary ! I woke up very late this morning : I dreamt of Him, of how I met Him... It was the morning, in a Starbucks in the quarter of Marylebone. Seated at a table at the bottom of the room, I was drinking my coffee when a mysterious man (the Man I described you yesterday, my dear Diary) came with his long dark cloak and his coffee and sat just in front of me. I love his cloak, like at the Victorian area, which gives him a British class very impressive that we see just after his powerful charisma.
I recognized him immediately even if he was more ‘‘perfect’’ in real. He looked at me and asked me if I could give him a cigarette. Surprised, I answered I didn’t smoke. He said : « I know you smoke 3 cigarettes per day and as you have still a new packet in your bag, can you give me one please ? ». Of course it was true. I gave him a cigarette. Without any thank, he ended his coffee very quickly.
When he stood up I couldn’t refrain from telling « You are a very special man, Sir. ». I don’t know why I told him this... Then he said, with a very distant voice : « People often say I am a psychopath. But I’m not... ». Before he finished his sentence I answered, without any control on myself : « I know ! And I think I fell in love with a sociopath. ». He looked at me very coldly, as he was trying to understand something very difficult : « I’m busy and in a hurry. If what you just said means something to you, you know where I live. ».
And he left me there. I was so surprised by what I confessed to this man as much as what he answered to me that I lost my mind... You understand now, my dear Diary, why I was so
confused to tell you what happened yesterday...
November, 6th
My dear Diary, I withstood temptation to see him. It was very difficult, as you can imagine. I don’t think I will resist not to go there very longer... But even if I see him, what shall I tell him ? I’m very lost. I think he doesn’t care about me but I still hope, one day, he will.
To be honest, dear Diary, I’m not very optimistic but hope helps me to live, it brings me a goal in my life... And now, I will live in hope of realizing my dream to be in his arms. I must do something ! I can’t just stay here... ! Tomorrow, I will go to his place and I will awake his hidden heart !
November, 7th
Today was the Day. I went to his place this morning. When the housekeeper (she is not really one) took me upstairs, the man of my passion was sitting on his sofa. His eyes were closed and he had his head in his hands. He couldn’t see me, I am absolutely sure. But at the second I put my feet in the room, he told me, without any movement : « So you are here. I knew you would come. Why did you change your perfume ? This one is Chanel... And why do you wear those shoes which are difficult to walk with for you since you broke your right ankle few years ago ? ». I saw that a discreet smile was appearing on his face. And as I wasn’t saying anything, few minutes later he said : « Am I right ? ». So I answered : « Of course you are. ». I sat just in front of him on a bigger sofa. Then he told me : « You are anxious I see. Tell me why ! What’s your problem ? You are on the client’s sofa after all ! ». Finally he looked at me. I was at the same time very shocked by the coldness of his look and also bewitched by the beauty of his eyes... I couldn’t answer anything. I don’t know why. Or maybe yes I do : because He was Him and I was in front of Him, talking
to Him... Just that... ?! After a long while, he said to me, without any emotion : « So if that’s all, thank you. ». While he said that, he stood up, took my arm, looked into my eyes, as coldly as you can’t imagine, and said : « It’s strange. I don’t understand why you came here or what you want from me. I can’t do anything for you. Goodbye. ». I don’t know where I found the courage (or the stupidity) to do that but I answered to him, without anymore reason : « You can do something because you are the subject of my problem... Can’t you see my love for you ? ». And I hurried out of the room and ran down the stairs, weeping.
You know my dear Diary, I don’t understand myself why I love the strangest man on Earth... The only one who don’t understand love... Why him ???
November, 14th
It’s been one week since I went to my love’s apartment. And today I made the same mistake. I hoped he could understand but he can’t ! Even with time, a lot of time... Even with patience, a lot of patience... Even if I found the good words to tell him, to explain to him... He won’t understand...
He can’t... His strange way of thinking is precisely the thing which makes him so special and the reason why he’s so loved by me. And this is precisely why he doesn’t understand me... Am I crazy to love him ? I don’t think so... But what I am sure of is that I am just crazy about him ! I can love him of course. No one can prevent me to love him ! I can’t live without loving him and I will suffer from this, that’s sure.
Today, I tried to talk with him but he asked me why I told him I loved him. My answer was honest. But of course it didn’t satisfied his curiosity and everybody knows how much he hates not to know or understand something... Anyway. I told him he was my ideal love and that I suffered to live far from him and also not to be understood by him.
That I couldn’t live like that ! After that he told me one last word. A word I don’t think I will ever forget : « TRY ». I mourned, I couldn’t detain my tears. Strangely he tried to offer me a helping hand but his look was so cold I ran out of the room as quickly as I could. His eyes were like the summit of the Lonely Mountain, so cold that nobody could ever hope to catch them...
November, 17th
I know he will never read this letter. But, my dear Diary, maybe some things have to stay hidden... So that’s what I wanted to tell him if it was possible. I write it here because I know it’ll never happen. That’s a sort of secret you know...
My dear Consulting Detective,
I know you are not a psychopath. You told me by yourself that people said that. But they’re wrong. Sure, you are different, and that’s precisely why I love you so much. You are more a highfunctioning sociopath than a psychopath. That’s what I think. I love you because you are different. But also because you are the most intelligent, the most particular and the most beautiful man in this poor world of stupid humans.
I never fell in love with anybody but you. And I fell in love with you at first sight ! Don’t you think it is unexpected my love ?
It may be because I’m different too... I don’t know... But the fact is you are my passion. You inspire me. And you obsess me all the time. In my dreams, in my minds... You know (or at least now you know it) I will never forget you, I can’t, because you are a part of me now. A part of my heart.
One day, maybe I will stop to weep... But the pain of your absence will hurt me forever... Your heart is as cold as a stone in the North and I try to give you some fire. But it’s vain as when Orpheus thought he could save his love Eurydice from the Underworld.
But in fact, the only thing you must know is that I love you and I’ll love you forever. And the only thing I miss is your love in return.
November, 19th
Dear Diary today is the end of my life. I don’t even know how I can still write... I cried and wept bitterly for hours and hours. And I will cry and weep for days and weeks and months !
This is horrible... What happened I mean... But I found a sort of courage in my deep sadness to write what happened. Then I’ll be free to do what I want with my future... If I have one... You have to know how difficult it is even if you can’t imagine that kind of pain. So powerful...
This morning at 9 o’clock, my phone rang : someone sent me a text. I don’t know how he found my phone number but he is so smart that I wasn’t surprised at all.
I know you love me but I don’t understand why. John tried to explain to me something about love. But to be honest, I don’t understand that human feeling. This emotion you feel for me is foreign to me so I concluded, with John’s help I have to admit, I don’t feel the same for you. But anyway... It doesn’t matter after all : the case is closed because you will never see me again. S.H.
I didn’t have the strength to answer, even if I knew all of this before. Maybe it was the biggest mistake of my whole life not to answer him, but I will never know.
One hour after that message, I heard on the radio Sherlock Holmes was dead. He committed suicide by falling from the top of the Rachenbach building. Apparently he did that because of a threat of Moriarty.
Goodbye my dear Diary, now my unique and eternal love is dead, I will have nothing to tell you. He was right : after all nothing matters now he’s gone. I am sorry but I don’t need you anymore. I just need to weep : Sherlock is dead !
Two years later :
To Sherlock Holmes
221b Baker Street
London
November, the 1st 2014221b Baker Street
London
My dear Sherlock,
I learnt yesterday in the newspaper you were not dead. That you simulated your own death and disappeared for almost two years to protect the people you care about. No, actually it was to protect the people you love, my dear. I believed you were not someone who could love someone, even his friends. And I didn’t believe you could love your friends enough to do what you did. To be honest, after our ‘‘conversations’’ (if we can call that conversations...) and your ultimate message (which was for me truly a kind of torture by the way...) I really thought you were not able to feel any emotion. How stupid was I ! I am truly sorry to have believed it even if was for a second !
I’d like so much to learn more things about you. You are my ideal love but I don’t know you ! I’d like to talk with you about all the extraordinary things you did and you saw in your life, everything that happened to you, who you saved, how you resolved cases... But particularly I’d like you to explain how you think, how you see the world, the feelings you have... (because of course you have those sort of things, you’re a human after all, not an extraterrestrial ! It’s just that you hide them very well...)
You told me you didn’t understand why I loved you… (well, why I love you...) You know, I’ll be honest with you, this time. When you asked me that question, my ideas were not clear. I was captivated by you, the magic and the charisma which comes from you, and of course the love I felt for you. I know my answer didn’t convince you that day, and moreover it wasn’t the answer to your question... The November, 14th. But, since that date, I had time to think about that. And I definitely find a real answer to your question. I think you probably forgot me and the stupid story that concerned me (not really forgot, you are Sherlock Holmes, but I mean you keep it in a box in your genius mind-palace but you don’t think about it). But I couldn’t know you alive and didn’t finish what I began. So, the moment comes when I must tell you the truth.
I read about you before I saw you That Day. I knew what you looked like but I’d never seen you in real. And when I saw you That Day, something happened to me. Something came to my heart. Something new. I never felt something like this before. I think I fell in love with you because you are different, unique and mysterious. I love you because you are the sociopath of my dreams. The man who can bring me happiness.
But don’t answer this letter or I’ll be more hurt than I am. And I can tell, even if it means nothing at all for you, I am so hurt that I wept since the moment you sent me that message.
Please, understand me for once : this letter is a farewell to my ideal love, the man I’ll ever love even in Death, you. You are a part of my heart and my life ended at the second I saw you for the first time.
Your particular way of thinking which makes you so loved by me prevent me to be loved or even understood by you.
I am sorry to waste your precious time so now, there is onlyone word left : farewell.
Goodbye my dear love, unique love of my dream foreternity, farewell Sherlock Holmes.
With love, Sandra.
For Benedict Cumberbatch, my source of inspiration.
(texte présent dans le livre INSPIRATIONS de Sandra Fazio)